The good news is that the dock strike/slowdown at West Coast ports was settled late on Friday. The bad news is that product deliveries are still likely to be delayed for a few weeks as dock workers set about unloading a large backlog of containers.
“It won’t clear up for weeks,” said Voxx Electronics President Tom Malone speaking of the situation for car audio and other goods.
MTX VP Marketing & Consumer Sales Joe Trentacoste expects the dock workers are “still 3 to 4 weeks behind, there’s so much sitting on the docks.”
The AP reported that “The volume of cargo that West Coast dockworkers and their employers must clear, now that they’ve reached a tentative contract agreement Friday evening, is staggering.” If stacked on top of each other, the containers waiting to be unloaded would rise nearly 250 miles at the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports alone. That excludes ports that are also backlogged in San Francisco, Seattle and Oakland.
Dock workers returned to work at full capacity on Saturday after a “work slowdown” since May arising from a labor dispute with the ports.
Car audio companies last week said that shipping delays were generally at one month.
Voxx said it had rerouted many of its products to East Coast ports. “We’ve had to move shipments to the East Coast, route them via water, which takes longer, and is more costly, and once on the East Coast, now we’re shipping them [over land] back to the West Coast customers,” said Malone.
The contract must still be finalized between the International Longshore and Warehouse Union’s (ILWU) rank-and-file, and the Pacific Maritime Association of employers, with a vote expected in April.
Dock workers allegedly retained near zero cost health insurance and an $11,000 increase in their maximum pension benefit to $91,000 plus a $1 per hour wage hike over each of the 5 years of the contract. Dock workers are said to make over $50 an hour.
Source: KOMO News
Actually Marty the average pay for union members at the west coast ports is over $100k a year. A desk jocky clerk makes $41/hour with a benefits package rivaled by fortune 500 ceo’s.
I’m not sure where those figures are coming from but the port workers are not driving around in Cadillacs and Bimmers. I do know that the health plan they get is very nice and covers the whole family, but I see many white-collar jobs get the same thing. Also they do have a pension plan but for most pensioners they cannot start receiving payments until they turn 65 years old and on average most pensioners die within 10 years of their first pension payment. Anyway even if they get paid $100 an hour, if the companies are still raking in record profits then isn’t it alright for the worker who is making that company viable to have a slice of the pie? Or is it just the point of beating down the fellow man because of jealousy? “If I don’t have it then he shouldn’t either.” But the CEO, he can have it. Actually let’s give him a big bonus.
The article is b.s. and all this anti-union stuff is b.s. too.
You really think the dock workers are making $50 an hour? That comes out to $104,000 a year. Come on, use some common sense. It’s so easy for the mega-billion dollar companies controlling the ports to come up with this propaganda and it’s the same tactic that has been used since the early part of the 20th century.
If you’re going to be upset, think about who to be upset with: the company raking in record profits or the port worker trying to provide for his family. Common sense is not so common.
There was no strike, It is called a lockout when the employer doesn’t allow the employees to go to work.
Just another example of why unions should not exist in todays business world. How a group of overpaid crane operators can hold the US economy hostage is absurd. The anointed one in the “white” house should have dropped the boom on them long ago, but there goes the union vote.
They make how much?! Plus generous benefits?! I’m a business owner breaking my back to not even make that much.
Not a misprint. See end of story here–http://www.komonews.com/news/local/With-deal-West-Coast-seaports-tackle-huge-cargo-backlog-293250201.html