2024 port workers strike

[Conqueeftador 124]

Coming October 1st if nothing big changes. 
 

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/port-officials-ready-for-first-strike-by-dockworkers-in-decades/
 

Twitter thread on potential outcomes here. 
 

 

[Jshep34 2,295]

I'm friends with a guy who works at the port. What they are asking for is insane. 75% pay raise, free insurance, 25% match to 401 k. Now the way thier pay works is depending on how/when they get called out they can get anywhere from 10 to 28 hours of overtime pay for working only 5 to 10 hours. Said their clerical employee who calls people out has been known to get paid 80+ hours of ot for only working 20 hours. Some people are clearing 350k a year. I don't feel bad for them. If they strike and get replaced then that's thier fault

[atomheartbevo 88,753]

7 minutes ago, Jshep34 said:

Said their clerical employee who calls people out has been known to get paid 80+ hours of ot for only working 20 hours.

[F250 28,382]

[MissingInAction 24,269]

Beginning of negotiations.

They know they may get 10% of their demands by starting at that ludicrous amount.

[Mother mopar 3,262]

I'm friends with a guy who works at the port. What they are asking for is insane. 75% pay raise, free insurance, 25% match to 401 k. Now the way thier pay works is depending on how/when they get called out they can get anywhere from 10 to 28 hours of overtime pay for working only 5 to 10 hours. Said their clerical employee who calls people out has been known to get paid 80+ hours of ot for only working 20 hours. Some people are clearing 350k a year. I don't feel bad for them. If they strike and get replaced then that's thier fault

I'm in the wrong job.

[Jshep34 2,295]

Negotiations have been ongoing. Crane operator can only work 5 hour shifts due to the physical demands of operating the cranes. As I've told him they have a great deal now. Especially due to not needing any college education to make 250k a year as new employees

[Laxtonto 11,769]

This is a no-win situation right now. If they get their demands met, then port fees and shipping costs will jump significantly. If they don’t we are looking at a full shutdown of the east coast shipping terminals and massive jumps in shipping rates and delays as they re-route to the West coast.

 

This is would get incredibly ugly very fast and right now it seems the union doesn’t mind if it happens. 
 

I would recommend on stocking up on seasonal items that ship from Europe, South America, and Africa as a personal consumer and be prepared to get slaughtered on bulk and can shipping as a business…

[BurntEyes 5,614]

Well, the other factor is if they reroute to Long Beach it's going to slow down that port too. Doesn't seem like it now but depending on length of the strike ships back up really fast. The west coast ports are all your electronic items from China.

Don't look now, but expect shortages on everything AV to IT needs just in time for Christmas consumer and end of year corporate and educational buying cycles. 

Big projects are going to see inventory delays.

Edited September 25 by BurntEyes

[Parliament 13,982]

So we're gonna go back to the 2022 supply chain drama?  Cool, cool

[Handcruser 2,799]

What kind of stuff should we be looking to stockpile now?

[Schulz2.0 28,616]

Just now, Handcruser said:

What kind of stuff should we be looking to stockpile now?

Porn

[immamac 41,374]

52 minutes ago, Laxtonto said:

This is a no-win situation right now. If they get their demands met, then port fees and shipping costs will jump significantly. If they don’t we are looking at a full shutdown of the east coast shipping terminals and massive jumps in shipping rates and delays as they re-route to the West coast.

 

This is would get incredibly ugly very fast and right now it seems the union doesn’t mind if it happens. 
 

I would recommend on stocking up on seasonal items that ship from Europe, South America, and Africa as a personal consumer and be prepared to get slaughtered on bulk and can shipping as a business…

Why wouldn't they just go through great lakes ports? That seems faster and better. 

[Captainant 26,864]

9 hours ago, Jshep34 said:

I'm friends with a guy who works at the port. What they are asking for is insane. 75% pay raise, free insurance, 25% match to 401 k. Now the way thier pay works is depending on how/when they get called out they can get anywhere from 10 to 28 hours of overtime pay for working only 5 to 10 hours. Said their clerical employee who calls people out has been known to get paid 80+ hours of ot for only working 20 hours. Some people are clearing 350k a year. I don't feel bad for them. If they strike and get replaced then that's thier fault

Are the demands you're citing from an article, or from firsthand knowledge? What you're describing IS one hell of a reach for 600,000 employees, but that many employees wouldn't be voting to strike if they didn't feel that management was fucking them over. 

If the union is demanding a bad deal, then that's usually in response to bad/punitive management. It'll be interesting to see the facts around this as they get reported and confirmed

[Deej 76,086]

15 minutes ago, immamac said:

Why wouldn't they just go through great lakes ports? That seems faster and better. 

We all know the monsters that lurk in the Great Lakes.

 

[Kennythetiger 9,276]

37 minutes ago, Handcruser said:

What kind of stuff should we be looking to stockpile now?

Toilet paper 

[WBT 20,133]

I coulda been a contender.  I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am.

[Captainant 26,864]

7 minutes ago, Kennythetiger said:

Toilet paper 

That's actually produced locally and usually within 100 miles or so of you. 100% American made, baby!

[atomheartbevo 88,753]

1 hour ago, Handcruser said:

What kind of stuff should we be looking to stockpile now?

1 hour ago, Laxtonto said:

I would recommend on stocking up on seasonal items that ship from..........Africa 

Raw bushmeat if you're RFK Jr.

[Conqueeftador 124]

1 hour ago, Laxtonto said:

This is a no-win situation right now. If they get their demands met, then port fees and shipping costs will jump significantly. If they don’t we are looking at a full shutdown of the east coast shipping terminals and massive jumps in shipping rates and delays as they re-route to the West coast.

 

This is would get incredibly ugly very fast and right now it seems the union doesn’t mind if it happens. 
 

I would recommend on stocking up on seasonal items that ship from Europe, South America, and Africa as a personal consumer and be prepared to get slaughtered on bulk and can shipping as a business…

 

1 hour ago, Parliament said:

So we're gonna go back to the 2022 supply chain drama?  Cool, cool

The tweet thread I linked goes through possible consequences. Basically, if it goes more than a few days we’ll have a big problem.  Prices will go up, but without Covid stimmy demand backing it up. 
 

I know hardly anything about the law around this, but seems like a special situation/national security issue a la air traffic controllers. I’m surprised it’s being allowed to go this far. 

[Conqueeftador 124]

2 hours ago, Jshep34 said:

Negotiations have been ongoing. Crane operator can only work 5 hour shifts due to the physical demands of operating the cranes. As I've told him they have a great deal now. Especially due to not needing any college education to make 250k a year as new employees

So it’s kind of like refinery work. 

[troph 23,963]

12 minutes ago, Conqueeftador said:

 

The tweet thread I linked goes through possible consequences. Basically, if it goes more than a few days we’ll have a big problem.  Prices will go up, but without Covid stimmy demand backing it up. 
 

I know hardly anything about the law around this, but seems like a special situation/national security issue a la air traffic controllers. I’m surprised it’s being allowed to go this far. 

Admin is pro labor unions - fact not politics - can’t intervene too early. I don’t recall the railway union issue a few years back wonder if that has any use for expectations we can have from the Admin. 

[Jshep34 2,295]

Are the demands you're citing from an article, or from firsthand knowledge? What you're describing IS one hell of a reach for 600,000 employees, but that many employees wouldn't be voting to strike if they didn't feel that management was fucking them over. 
If the union is demanding a bad deal, then that's usually in response to bad/punitive management. It'll be interesting to see the facts around this as they get reported and confirmed

Firsthand knowledge. They feel that way cause a ceo got a huge raise/bonus

[Jshep34 2,295]

So it’s kind of like refinery work. 

I work at a huge refinery for a major company. We are union representation. They only fight for 3 to 5% raise.

[Conqueeftador 124]

1 minute ago, Jshep34 said:

18 minutes ago, Conqueeftador said:

So it’s kind of like refinery work. 

I work at a huge refinery for a major company. We are union representation. They only fight for 3 to 5% raise.

No, I meant can make a good living with no college degree. Like the people in Deer Park, Pasadena. 

[Jshep34 2,295]

Screenshot of issues on the contract. I would usually side with the workers. But with knowing how they get paid for hours that they aren't physically working plus how many hours that is in a year I don't feel bad for them.

[Laxtonto 11,769]

1 hour ago, immamac said:

Why wouldn't they just go through great lakes ports? That seems faster and better. 

Lack of port Infrastructure to deal with the load, plus most major bulk or container ships can't fit through the locks to unload. Maybe reroute some to Montreal and truck to the US, but now we are talking about additional delays to customs plus another bump in cots/import taxes.

1 hour ago, Handcruser said:

What kind of stuff should we be looking to stockpile now?

Heavy equipment made in SA and raw bulk like bauxite, iron ore, nickel and lithium from Africa. Then your standard European export set. If you are looking at potential shorts on commodities, I would drill down into how sensitive HRC Steel to the import price of iron ore from abroad and how much comes through the East Coast ports vs being shipped via train from Canada and the US.

The bigger problem is it isn't just this shipping cycle, it will also impact next several ones as you deal with the bullwhip effect downstream concern is that if they all reroute, you swamp the West Coast and then we have a cascade of delays for not this shipping cycle but the next several ones as you deal with the bullwhip effect downstream. This is going to the be inverse of what happened when China shut down its export ports during COVID.

Hope for a quick resolution to this because if it lasts say two weeks, we could see a much smaller set of stock for the golden retail season. If we limit consumer spending this winter, how many retailers miss their 4th projections? It can cascade into a much larger financial issue that could see a downgrade in GDP estimates..

 

[NotActuallyALonghorn 4,956]

It's stuff like this that reinforces my belief that unions should be subject to the same anti-trust legislation that the companies who employ the workers are. 

[Al Bundy's Napoleon Hand 13,337]

[Nice Guy Eddie 13,277]

13 hours ago, WBT said:

I coulda been a contender.  I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am.

Finally caught On the Waterfront a month ago. One viewing was enough.

Edited September 26 by Nice Guy Eddie

[Al Bundy's Napoleon Hand 13,337]

1 hour ago, NotActuallyALonghorn said:

It's stuff like this that reinforces my belief that unions should be subject to the same anti-trust legislation that the companies who employ the workers are. 

The same? 

Oh no.

[NotActuallyALonghorn 4,956]

Labor is a resource just like anything else. Why should one entity be able to hold a monopoly over it? The end results are the same, or at least similar enough that they should be similarly regulated. 

[troph 23,963]

9 hours ago, NotActuallyALonghorn said:

Labor is a resource just like anything else. Why should one entity be able to hold a monopoly over it? The end results are the same, or at least similar enough that they should be similarly regulated. 

Collective bargaining is hardly a monopoly not even close. Restricting employees from collectively bargaining is like saying shareholders can’t band together to bring suits against a board of directors. 
 

there are already circuit breakers for strategic concerns allowing the Executive to intervene. Add to that persuasive power of the POTUS and thats’s more than enough. 

Edited September 26 by troph

[Captainant 26,864]

10 hours ago, NotActuallyALonghorn said:

Labor is a resource just like anything else. Why should one entity be able to hold a monopoly over it? The end results are the same, or at least similar enough that they should be similarly regulated. 

An entity "holding a monopoly over labor" is shit like Jimmy John's forcing their minimum wage employees to sign noncompetes so they can force wages down by preventing employees from being able to find another job.

Not employees collectively bargaining. Jesus Christ lol. 

[texashorne 1,177]

I am hearing that for every 1 day of the strike, there will be 5 days of supply chain disruption. If this thing lasts a week, we're looking at mid November until everything is balanced out again. 

In addition to a lack of freight coming into the East coast from the Ports, trucks in the West won't be willing to go East without substantial $$$, because when they get there there will be nothing coming back out. It will be interesting for sure.

 

[crash_davis 23,038]

On 9/25/2024 at 7:57 AM, Deej said:

We all know the monsters that lurk in the Great Lakes.

 

Spoiler that! There are children who peruse this site.

[Incredulity 11,141]

Somewhere a poor bastard working in purchasing has a critical delivery 10 day out headed for Philadelphia.   After just spending 2 years unwinding a stockpile of stuff from the pandemic.

[Laxtonto 11,769]

32 minutes ago, texashorne said:

I am hearing that for every 1 day of the strike, there will be 5 days of supply chain disruption. If this thing lasts a week, we're looking at mid November until everything is balanced out again. 

In addition to a lack of freight coming into the East coast from the Ports, trucks in the West won't be willing to go East without substantial $$$, because when they get there there will be nothing coming back out. It will be interesting for sure.

 

Another interesting question is what does this do the the EU's and China's current financial data? Both are teetering on the edge of recession and very simply, most terms on contracts finalized full payment are contingent on delivery. If it can't get off the boat, you aren't getting paid (in part or full depending on the setup). If the economy is already tight and interest rates are high, then we are looking at a limit in short-term bridge financing while they are waiting for the goods to hit the port... This whole thing could blow up and make the markets puke everywhere.

[Deej 76,086]

31 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

There are children who peruse this site.

That's a bad idea. 

[crash_davis 23,038]

5 minutes ago, Deej said:

That's a bad idea. 

How else are the children to grow up to become assholes?

[Jshep34 2,295]

Strike will be 85k employees

[Samson's Wig 3,154]

Greed is shitty when executives wield it, and it's just as shitty when a bunch of low-skill assclowns wield it.  The Biden administration should have been on top of this, and there is no reason for the rest of the country to be impacted because a bunch of fucksticks who are already significantly overpaid decide to say "fuck 'em" to millions of people who work harder for less money.  Unions are great, until they're not.

[Wally Fairway 5,465]

On 9/26/2024 at 10:51 AM, crash_davis said:

Spoiler that! There are children who peruse this site.

you mean other than the ones who post here?

On 9/25/2024 at 8:57 AM, Deej said:

We all know the monsters that lurk in the Great Lakes.

 

WTF dude - why are you doxing me?

[Jshep34 2,295]

I'm all for fair pay. Wanting a 75% pay raise is crazy. I know in the refinery that unions if they strike they just use contractors and non union supervision ( people who got promoted that use to be union employees). So they don't feel any impact from a strike. Ports don't have this option. Due to the amount of people it takes to unload 1 container.

[Captainant 26,864]

10 hours ago, Jshep34 said:

I'm all for fair pay. Wanting a 75% pay raise is crazy. I know in the refinery that unions if they strike they just use contractors and non union supervision ( people who got promoted that use to be union employees). So they don't feel any impact from a strike. Ports don't have this option. Due to the amount of people it takes to unload 1 container.

You do know that the opening number in a negotiation is the starting point and not the ending point right? The fact that their management won't even come to the table is why things are as fucked as they are. 

Maybe the shipping companies should have considered their customers needs when making choices how to run their operations? Or you could just blame the workers, same/same I guess

[choripan 770]

17 minutes ago, Captainant said:

You do know that the opening number in a negotiation is the starting point and not the ending point right? The fact that their management won't even come to the table is why things are as fucked as they are. 

Maybe the shipping companies should have considered their customers needs when making choices how to run their operations? Or you could just blame the workers, same/same I guess

I am about as pro-union as they come -- growing up with a weird autoimmune issue as a kid, I literally would not be alive were it not for my dad's USW and UAW health plans over the years! -- but there are two issues I don't align with unions on:

• Making ridiculous initial demands that get picked up by the news and that hurts the cause. To me, it's like animal welfare advocates that throw the buckets of paint on people. It's easy to paint poorly in the news and just hurts the cause overall.
• Unions that are overextractive and hurt the cause. If those stats about these dockworkers are true, they're just as culpable as executives that 100x their employees' income and, again, it's easy to paint in a negative light and hurt the cause. Also, to the overextractive piece, I'd add public sector unions that "get theirs" for retirees and older workers with respect to pensions and health care and bankrupt or hamstring government entities. Again, it makes it easy to paint the union as the bad guy and hurts the union's effectiveness when it comes to actually fighting for things we all deserve like a living wage, reasonable health and retirement benefits, and safe working conditions.

The way I am following this story, seems like these dockworkers are fucking both up.

[JMFP 1,105]

Somebody needs to show their work, I'm not buying that these dudes make $200k or more a year. 

 

 

 

 

[Captainant 26,864]

7 minutes ago, choripan said:

Unions that are overextractive and hurt the cause. If those stats about these dockworkers are true, they're just as culpable as executives that 100x their employees' income and, again, it's easy to paint in a negative light and hurt the cause. Also, to the overextractive piece, I'd add public sector unions that "get theirs" for retirees and older workers with respect to pensions and health care and bankrupt or hamstring government entities. Again, it makes it easy to paint the union as the bad guy and hurts the union's effectiveness when it comes to actually fighting for things we all deserve like a living wage, reasonable health and retirement benefits, and safe working conditions.

I mean, union's could solve world hunger and homelessness and the business consultant class would still paint the union in a bad light lol. And the (your words) reasonable health and retirement benefits and safe working conditions we "enjoy" today wouldn't exist but for the trust busting and union efforts of a century ago. 

And even then, there's been so much regression for wage earners. Healthcare is as expensive as rent, and if someone ACTUALLY gets sick you can kiss your savings goodbye. Retirement is a fucking joke because any excess earnings from the business don't go to those who actually did the work and EARNED IT, it goes to the executive and business consultant class via stock buybacks. The money to do all these things is there. It's just being stolen from the workers by the business and disbursed to her shareholders instead 

[TwiceHorn 30,734]

On 9/26/2024 at 8:53 AM, Captainant said:

An entity "holding a monopoly over labor" is shit like Jimmy John's forcing their minimum wage employees to sign noncompetes so they can force wages down by preventing employees from being able to find another job.

Not employees collectively bargaining. Jesus Christ lol. 

Well, unions do involve collusion that has anti-competitive effects.  And unions often have market power.  There are antitrust exemptions for union activities.

But, we adjudge unions to be sufficiently beneficial to grant them those exemptions.  Probably because unlike "business," the alternative to unions would be thousands of sole proprietorships, a highly fragmented labor market.  There is no intermediate organization that lacks market power, as in the case of corporations or other business entities. Labor actually needs some market power.

It might be interesting if there was more than one union representing a segment of labor, so there was competition among labor organizations.

[Laxtonto 11,769]

The bigger issue is that the ILA refuse to negotiate unless all demands are met, which isn’t really negotiating. They have been sitting out and refusing to negotiate for a month or so.

l almost wonder if they were expecting the Biden administration to start the process for Taft-Hartley and then be forced to accepted  the NRLB negotiations and outcome as fact, instead of actual negotiations. My feeling is the NRLB would use the ILWU’s recent agreement as the baseline and then tweak it higher. That would be a major win for most of the ILA because the difference in tax structure between the west and east coast.

With the steps for Taft-Hartley not being started, the union only has the UMX offer to take back to their members , which the leadership have stated from the very beginning is not acceptable. So the leadership can’t accept less than their extreme position they pitched from UMX with losing face and without Taft-Hartley their isn’t going to be a mechanism to allow the ILA be save face and blame the major difference in the new deal on the NRLB.

 

This shouldn’t have ever gotten this far. I’m not a fan of governmental intervention in labor disputes, but this is one that the major impact to the country should be taken into account and force a negotiation through the Taft-Hartley act.