NEWS ALERT: Concerns rising as longshoremen strike deadline looms, affecting multiple shipping ports

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From The Hill: Tens of thousands of longshoremen at 14 ports along the East Coast and Gulf of Mexico are poised to walk off the job early Tuesday morning if their union and employers cannot reach a new labor agreement by midnight, threatening to disrupt both the economy and the 2024 election.

Negotiations between the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) and the U.S. Maritime Alliance (USMX) soured earlier this summer, and the two sides remain far apart on key issues with the contract set to expire at midnight.

The ILA says it represents about 85,000 longshoremen, and the USMX says the current contract covers around 25,000 port workers. This would be the union’s first strike at all East Coast and Gulf Coast ports since 1977.

The ports handle a majority of U.S. container volume and a quarter of annual international trade in the U.S. — about $3 trillion, according to the business research nonprofit The Conference Board.

The economic impact of the strike is estimated to be about $540 million per day, according to the Conference Board.

Analysts at JPMorgan have estimated the cost could be as high as $5 billion.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) said in a statement on Sunday, “I warned about this days ago. Longshoremen voted to strike, they walk out Tuesday. 85,000 dockworkers from Maine to Texas. Will impact 36 ports and all imports & exports from Maine to Texas! This could get rough.”

On Friday, Greene shared the following warning:

There is a strike on the verge of happening Tuesday Oct 1 that could cripple our economy and could leave store shelves bare by shutting down ports that handle 68% of our country’s containerized exports and 56% of containerized imports.

For every single day they strike it could take 6 days to catch up. Meaning just a 5 day strike could take a month to unload and load ships at ports up and down the East coasts and Gulf coasts!

The International Longshoremen’s Association, representing 45,000 dockworkers from Maine to Texas at 14 different ports, contracts expire Sept 30th and they are demanding higher wages equal to other dockworker’s pay and guaranteed job security that they will not be replaced by automation and AI.

1977 was the last time they went on strike. That was long before America became dependent on foreign imports for food and necessary goods.

It’s very important to understand how critical this is given that America is now in a $36 billion dollar food trade deficit for the first time in our nation’s history. Also, the Biden-Harris administration and Congressional out of control spending has driven inflation so high that many Americans can’t afford quality of life.

I think this situation is serious and could be a crisis going into the election, holidays, and winter depending if they strike and how long it lasts. Retailers have been trying to stock up in preparation, but it’s always smart to be personally prepared just in case.

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