‘Corporate Greed vs. Workers Rights’: Dockworkers in U.S. Go on Strike


  • October 3, 2024
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It’s the first strike at the three dozen East and Gulf Coast ports in U.S. from Maine to Texas since 1977 with thousands of port workers forming picket lines from Massachusetts to Texas demanding higher pay rise and protection against automation of jobs, among other benefits.

 

Groundxero | October 3, 2024

 

Dockworkers at East and Gulf Coast ports in U.S. went on strike from 1st October. The International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA), the union that represents the 45,000 affected dockworkers, didn’t accept terms offered by the United States Maritime Alliance (USMX), the port operators’ group, and initiated a walkout on Tuesday morning. USMX is made up of global shipping companies that made “windfall profits” in 2021 and 2022.

 

The ILA and USMX were negotiating pay increases, healthcare benefits, and the use of automated or semi-automated terminals, which threaten jobs. Wage rise emerged as a central point of contention. While USMX offered an hourly pay rise of $2.50 each year over the course of a six-year contract, the ILA asked for a $5 raise per year, the Times reported. ILA referred to the wages the port operators were offering as “insulting” and “a joke” and said “the Ocean Carriers represented by USMX want to enjoy rich billion-dollar profits that they are making in 2024, while they offer ILA Longshore Workers an unacceptable wage package that we reject.”

 

It’s the first strike at the three dozen East and Gulf Coast ports from Maine to Texas since 1977 with port workers forming picket lines from Massachusetts to Texas, and demanding higher pay rise and protection against automation of jobs, among other benefits. Workers picketed at the ports, carrying placards with messages such as: “Automation Hurts Families: ILA Stands For Job Protection”; “No Work Without a Fair Contract”; “Corporate Greed vs. Workers Rights: ILA Demands Fairness!”; and “Fight Automation, Save Jobs: ILA Demands Job Security.”

 

Joe Mosquera, a crane operator and union organizer told The Guardian “This is for our future generations. To keep automation out is to keep our jobs for the future. And if anything becomes automated, we want to make sure that there’s a worker to back it up.”

The striking dockworkers drew support from other unions, including the United Auto Workers (UAW). “The UAW stands in solidarity with the 45,000 courageous port workers fighting for economic justice. Without their labor, nothing in this country moves,” the UAW wrote on social media.

 

The industry’s biggest strike since 1977 is already having an impact. Reuters reported Thursday that “at least 45 container vessels that have been unable to unload had anchored up outside the strike-hit East Coast and Gulf Coast ports by Wednesday, up from just three before the strike began on Sunday.” Union officials are watching the Biden administration closely in the current labor dispute. Biden angered many union members and working class advocates in 2022 by working with Congress to intervene to stop a major railworkers strike. Many believe the president won’t want to do that again ahead of the November election, for fear of hurting Democratic turnout.

 

Sen. Bernie Sanders has also urged Biden not to interfere. He wrote on social media: “He should not invoke Taft-Hartley to end the port strike. Dock workers are striking against excessive corporate greed. The shipping industry has made $400 billion in profits since 2020. It’s time for dock workers to be treated with respect, not contempt.”

 

“When the big shipping industry was faced with a choice—share its success with the U.S. workers that delivered it, or go overboard with greed—its executives clearly chose the latter.”

 

Meanwhile, amid a strike that dockworkers argue is about “corporate greed vs. workers rights,” a watchdog group, Accountable.US, has highlighted how a shipping giant has recently poured billions of dollars into stock buybacks. Accountable.US on Wednesday pointed out that the Danish shipping company Maersk “has spent $6.5 billion buying back nearly 3 million Class A and B shares as of January 2024.” “The same foreign-owned shipping giants that say they can’t find the money for fairer wages and treatment of American port workers managed to find billions of dollars to enrich a small group of wealthy investors after riding a wave of record profits,” said Liz Zelnick, director of the Economic Security & Corporate Power Program at Accountable.US, in a statement. “When the big shipping industry was faced with a choice—share its success with the U.S. workers that delivered it, or go overboard with greed—its executives clearly chose the latter,” Zelnick added.

“We are prepared to fight as long as necessary, to stay out on strike for whatever period of time it takes, to get the wages and protections against automation our ILA members deserve,” ILA President Harold Daggett said in a statement.

 

The Biden administration is facing pressure from business interests who worry about the economic impact of a strike just before the elections. More than half of the country’s container shipments go through the three dozen affected ports, and a prolonged strike would cause major economic disruptions. JPMorgan analysts have estimated that the strike would cost the U.S. economy about $5 billion per day. The shutdown, though, won’t affect cruise ships or military cargo, which the ILA has pledged to continue transporting.

 

(This report has been collated from news articles on the dockworkers strike published on Common Dreams)

 

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Tags : workers' rights Dockworkers Strike Corporate Greed ILA Automation Job Security
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