From Christmas toys to clothing and auto parts, shortages of imported products are forcing factories to idle, store shelves to sit empty, and consumers to panic.
What else is in short supply? The truth about what’s causing this economic crisis.
President Joe Biden, who brags about running “the most pro-union administration in history,” won’t admit that longshoremen’s unions are holding the nation hostage, refusing to allow the use of automated equipment to unload container ships and get the goods onto trucks faster.
The U.S. is the world’s largest importer, but its major ports at Los Angeles and Long Beach, California, rank a dismal 328 and 333, respectively, in the World Bank’s Container Port Performance Index. That means nightmare inefficiency worse than most developing countries. Not one U.S. port made it into the top 50 for speed and efficiency. In contrast, Japan’s Yokohama port ranks No. 1.
Nearly 100 container ships have been waiting off the Los Angeles coastline to be unloaded. The longer they wait, the more prices for imported goods rise, clobbering consumers.
On Wednesday, Biden announced a “gamechanger,” saying the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach would stay open more hours for a “90-day sprint” to Christmas. The truth is, most ports around the world operate 24/7. Port operators here haven’t done that in the past because union contracts require paying higher hourly rates for night and weekend labor. Dockworker salaries already average $171,000 a year. Wednesday’s announcement was a concession from port operators, not the unions.
But increased hours won’t fix the bottlenecks. The added hours will boost cargo movement by less than 10%, or an estimated 3,500 containers a week. The real problem is the unions’ tooth-and-nail opposition to labor-saving equipment. Cranes in automated ports operate at least twice as fast as cranes in outdated U.S. ports. Biden’s port envoy John Porcari let the truth out when he said last week; it’s “your grandfather’s infrastructure that we’re working with.”
Unions won’t have it any other way. The International Longshoremen’s Association contract, which extends to 2024, blocks the use of automation technology. Willie Adams, president of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, which represents West Coast workers, says automated cargo handling equipment will not be tolerated.
Here’s the biggest lie, straight from Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. He went on parental leave in August, ignoring the worsening supply crisis. But he emerged from diaper duty long enough on Sunday to shovel some grown-up manure. Buttigieg said dysfunctional ports are “one more example of why we need to pass the infrastructure bill.”
In truth, the $17 billion for ports in the infrastructure bill is mostly for emissions reductions, repairs, and dredging. Nothing is allocated for labor-saving automation. In fact, section 30102 of Biden’s Build Back Better Bill expressly prohibits the use of funds provided there to be used for automation.
No surprise. Build Back Better is crammed with pro-union favors, including an extra $4,500 sweetener available only to consumers who buy a union-made electric vehicle and a whopping $14,000 tax credit to homeowners who install energy-saving devices and electrical equipment, provided the contractor doing the job is unionized—otherwise, zip. Organized labor is spending millions in advertising to get the bill passed.
Biden is bought, paid for, and controlled by the unions. Some 98.8% of union money spent on the 2020 presidential contest went to Biden. Now it’s payback time.
The media is hiding that. Last week, a Washington Post news story claimed: “voters blame presidents for all sorts of pocketbook problems that presidents can’t fix.”
Biden could take action, but he won’t. Despite pushing for trillions in new spending, Biden is choosing not to automate American ports. He’s kowtowing to his union backers. That means keeping America’s ports dysfunctional. It’s a drag on the overall economy.
There are many causes of the current supply shortages, from too few truckers to shutdowns in Asia due to COVID. But one problem is fixable: our obsolete ports. If only Biden had the will to act.
Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York. Follow her on Twitter @Betsy_McCaughey.
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Wait a minute. A high school flunkie who does unskilled manual labor as a dock worker makes $171K?! My buddy is an IT pro in cyber-security with years of experience, and he didn’t come close to making that. WTF?
This exactly why Unions have lived out their usefulness, higher wages , less time working, slow downs. Those dock workers are unionized and lazy.
Hey AMAC. How can I share this article?
Adding to the slowdown are the new California regulations on big rig trucks that must be 2011 or later, or repowered with a newer engine. Many trucks that drive the nation’s highways can no longer operate in California. If the 100 ships offshore could be unloaded, there are not enough trucks to legally haul the conex boxes to their destinations. California, you have socked it to the American consumer.
There’s gotta be a way to separate Commiefornia from the rest of these united states. It is Not America in any way, shape, or form.
Socialists support other Socialists. Organized labor is Socialist, Biden is what his current Socialist billionaire and Communist Chinese handlers tell him to be. Whatever it takes to bring the U.S. to its knees so that American citizens will trade hard won freedoms for perceived government security, hateful Socialists will do.
Every time you pull up the skirt of the operations of a business/government/union cooperative, you see the same thing…..poor performance….high pay….slack work…manipulation of the system and millions being set aside for personal gain, political pandering and theft. Union workers need to get wise….they are being used like pimped out ladies of the evening. While there may still be a need for a union to some degree….they have outlived their usefulness when it comes to benefiting this nation overall. My recommendation…..”push your elected leaders to make this nation a right to work nation.” Break the hold unions have on our economy and way of life. Most unions are far too powerful in influence and control of the government’s activities….and far too many polititians are already beholding to the unions to such a degree, they can’t take a dump without union sign-off>
Well said
The unions are run by organized crime, for the most part. Why isn’t the DOJ busting them left & right?
I think you know the answer.
This is another example of the cons of unions, (I am not saying that there aren’t pro reasons to need unions) but this power play reasoning of not using a technology to improve workers efficiency is problematic. I am quite sure they are using the claims of security of jobs of the current workers, because the unions use seniority as the preference for who works certain position, which may include some workers who don’t or can’t learn to use the newer equipment. That would mean that these “preferred” workers would need to have job changes to alternate positions (the union would not allow these workers to be fired) but those workers may have demanded that they can’t be forced out to different positions if it also means a decrease in pay. Neither side of the bargaining table is giving any leeway in this. The company should be encouraging the move to more automative equipment use, but it should not be eliminating the current workers in place either but find a way to pay them their current wage level in another position, eliminating the protests of the workers to not change to automation. The unions need to realize that just because a worker has seniority doesn’t mean they are the most productive for the job needed for the job at current standards. Sure guarantee their jobs but work out a compromise to adapt to current job needs.
This same attitude is occurring at the USPS, the workers totally rejected automation, using the excuses of poor maintenance of the sorting machines, requesting more time for human processing of the mail, which they got and now are attempting to blame someone else because they don’t like all the steps involved with human processing of the mail, which require scanning everything, which means the slackers ( the one who did the least amount of work in the most amount of time) have to actually show a productivity level.
In both incidents, not adapting job skills to current job needs is a dual problem of both the company and the union, especially when neither one wants to compromise. Yes, you can automate the job but NO, you can’t simple fire current employees to eliminate labor costs, you have to invest training and re-training of these employees–eventually in the long term, there will be Maybe less employees because of automation, but don’t discuss employees like mere numbers. Adapt, change, train, followup, retrain, etc.
It won’t be long till the Union members figure out they are the prisoners of the DemocRat Party and only upper level big shots in the Unions will gain from this tie-in.
They know it and always have, those few that don’t like it can’t do anything about it.
Unions are practically an arm if the Democrat Party which is why I became a BECK OBJECTOR so that I was not required to contribute that portion of required dues (to keep my job) that was used to fund political issues, which on average was over 10% each year.
The current WH leadership is influenced by the SOCIALIST LED DEMOCRAT PARTY THIS PARTY, INCLUDING MR BIDEN, IS INTENTIONALLY CAUSING CRISIS AND MORE CRISIS IN GOVERNMENT ! THESE ARE EVIL .TREASONOUS PEOPLE!; THEY ARE DESTROYING AMERICA AND OUR GOVERNMENT AND OUR DEMOCRACY !
Yeah, they want to break America down and “build back better”. In other words, a socialist country where everyone is on the dole.
Govt employee unions need to be broken up, for sure. When I was in DC, back in ’07, I could feel the evil taking place in those govt bldgs. The smell of attempting total control of all aspects of our lives seemed to just WREAK from them. DC – disgusting capital.
The Democratic way is to reward incompetence and discourage hard work. Why aren’t Republican and others flaunting this information? We are heading downhill at a rapid pace and should not be throwing good money after bad. Let’s publish the exact numbers media and others and see where tax dollars are going.
THE EVIL SOCIALIST DEM PARTY AND THEIR LEADERS R TREASONERS
A LARGE PORTION OF CA .TAX DOLLARS IS BEING USED TO CONTINUE TO BUILD BILLION $$$$$ TRAIN THAT CONNECTS SAN FRAN TO SACRAMENTO.. A PERFECT 3XAMPLE OF WASTEFUL SOCIALIST DEM GOVERNMENTS WISH LIST IN SACRAMENTO AND IN SAN FRAN HOME OF COMRADE PELOSI !!!!!!
Excellent analysis of this horrible situation. Obviously, Biden cares more about unions than the general public.
What floats on swamp water?
Ohhh, do you really want an answer to that question?
OK, I’ll keep the answer wording clean – the answer is Washington, DC.
THE SOCIALIST DEM PARTY IS A DICTATORSHIP AND IS RUINING GOVERNMENT IN THE GOLDEN STATE
NASTY NANCY AND GOV NEWSOME ARE STRONG PERPS THEY SUPPORT.. POWER AND CONTROL BY A ONE PARTY SOCIALIST GOVERNMENT !
We have no Republican leadership to lead the masses to counteract this Socialist regime.
A few Governors and Trump is all we have. The CCP and the corrupt Unions are killing this country.
I see little hope for America as we knew her.
Rand Paul ? Ben Carson ? Ron DeSantis ?
Quid Pro Quo anyone?
I just wish I knew who or the names of the people actually running this country! That will surely be scary!
I can give you the main one – Georgie Boy Soros. He funds anti-fuh. He funds “media matters.” and hundreds more anti American, anti Constitutional outfits. Soros, the Hungarian spider who collaborated with the Reich as a teen.
Just look for all that worked under Obama and now work under (over) Biden!
That ugly demon – George S.o.r.o.s
Little did I know that 50 years ago my minor in Chinese language would change to where Chinese will now become the major language worldwide! . . . I guess I can thank Jackass Joe for that!
Yeah didnt invite Tesla for EV event since Tesla is Non Union
Of course, this early in Biden’s time, if a long term problem exists, it means Trump didn’t do anything either.
Between 2017 – 2020, America saw the lowest unemployment rate from every demographic/race/sector out there. It was historic. The country was doing better than it ever was before under President Trump. Illegal boarder crossings all but ceased entirely. We had no new wars and were in fact respected throughout the world with President Trump as our leader. Now look at the state of everything in America and how low we’ve gotten since F joe biden was fraudulently elected. It’s no wonder the democrat party icon is the jackass. The entire left resembles the actions and attitude of the jackass. So very fitting.
Just a bit of an adjunct to what you said. Under Trump’s fiscal plan, black unemployment was at an all time low. Hispanic unemployment was at an all time low. Unemployment nation wide was at a 60 year low.
And I don’t think that there has been, at least in my life time, any president who has been nominated 5 times for the Nobel Peace prize. The Middle East was relatively peaceful.
Zip- go back to sleep.