Remember that dockworkers’ strike that was postponed till mid-January, in order to help Biden prior to the election?
In case you don’t remember, this will refresh your memory:
The International Longshoremen’s Association, which represents 45,000 striking U.S. workers, said the union and USMX have reached a “tentative agreement on wages and have agreed to extend the Master Contract until January 15, 2025 to return to the bargaining table to negotiate all other outstanding issues.”
On Wednesday this announcement was made:
“We are pleased to announce that ILA and USMX have reached a tentative agreement on a new six-year ILA-USMX Master Contract, subject to ratification, thus averting any work stoppage on January 15, 2025,” the two parties said in a joint statement. “This agreement protects current ILA jobs and establishes a framework for implementing technologies that will create more jobs while modernizing East and Gulf coast ports – making them safer and more efficient, and creating the capacity they need to keep our supply chains strong.”
“This is a win-win agreement that creates ILA jobs, supports American consumers and businesses, and keeps the American economy the key hub of the global marketplace,” the statement added.
A separate statement from Harold Daggett, head of the ILA, gave “full credit” to Trump for the deal, telling the incoming president he has “proven…to be one of the best friends of working men and women in the United States.”
He credited a meeting he had with Trump last month as the reason the union won protections against automation.
A statement from Trump says this, among other things:
I’ve studied automation and know just about everything there is to know about it. The amount of money saved is nowhere near the distress, hurt and harm it causes for American Workers, in this case, our Longshoremen. Foreign companies have made a fortune in the U.S. by giving them access to our markets. They shouldn’t be looking for every last penny knowing how many families are hurt.”
Interesting.
Trump has never been a conservative or a libertarian. Because he’s an outsider, he’ll be breaking up some of the old rackets, but he’ll also be making deals with some of them as well establishing some new ones.
Don’t know how many of us remember Scott Walker in Wisconsin, much more a man of the Right than Trump, but even he exempted police and firefighters from his moves against the public sector unions.
It just reinforces that electing Trump is only the start to effecting real change; we’ve earned a breathing space, but we can’t just use it to breathe. There’s a lot wrong that Trump won’t be able to fix, or will have to compromise with in order to fix something worse. Real reform has to come from the bottom, and it is up to us to do more than just read the news, be indignant about it, and vote every two years.
Real reform has to come from the bottom, and it is up to us to do more than just read the news, be indignant about it, and vote every two years.
What do you suggest?
@IrishOtter49:What do you suggest?
Depends on your situation. Most of the readers here are retirement age, and what it might make sense for you to do is different from what it would make sense for a new college grad to do or a family with young children.
Long story short, you’d need to change your lifestyle to deny putting yourself and your money in the service of those who seek to enslave you, and do what you can to persuade others to do the same. Political engagement–real political engagement, not reading and commenting–is only aspect of this.
Think about what happens when you vote: you are choosing from a menu pre-selected by people with power and money. Is it surprising that voting accomplishes so little? There is much to do to change the balance of power and money.
Had to double-check Trump’s quoted statement.
‘Is the money saved by dock automation worth it?’ That’s the question I asked Grok, Copilot, ChatGPT, Gemini and perplexity.
I expected Trump to be 100% wrong, but AI’s answers didn’t really seem to prove him right or wrong – my reading skills ain’t the best but most of the answers seemed to suggest ‘that it depends.‘
My dad was either in Africa or Italy during a Longshoremen strike in WW2, and I’ve formed a bad opinion about Longshoremen—from childhood years of hearing him tell that story. Hence, I ran some more AI searches and Google searches on Longshoremen strike history. Yes, they are usually timed for the best leverage in their favor, but there didn’t seem to be a lot of major strikes since – like 1934.
Guess I’ll trust Trump on this one – since it is something he probably knows a lot about, but maybe doesn’t ‘know just about everything there is to know about it‘. 😉
“I’ve studied automation and know just about everything there is to know about it.”
Trump’s bragadoccio makes me chuckle.
Also, great comments by Niketas at 1:52 pm and 2:42 pm, and IrishOtter49 at 2:35 pm today!
I think Niketas at 1:52 meant “Political engagement–real political engagement, not reading and commenting–is only one aspect of this.”
There’s a balance that can be struck between labor and management. My 25 years as a member of the Airline Pilots Association (ALPA) was an education in how things can go well and also poorly. Basically, it comes down to personalities. If the CEO and his team, or the ALPA leaders, wanted to show how tough and masculine they were, things went pretty badly. When both sides were willing to sit down and be transparent in their talks, a balance was achieved that was usually a win, win.
Of course, ALPA was, and still is, run by the members. As opposed to the Teamsters, ILA, AFL-CIO, etc. which are run by professional labor organizers.
We were able to vote out our leaders who weren’t effective. The pros can’t be voted out.
Unions can be a force for good. Many airline safety measures were instituted by ALPA.
And speaking of automation, the airlines are no doubt looking at AI as a way to reduce the cockpit to one or no pilots. 🙂
AI will create many labor issues over the coming years. I hope our leaders are forward leaning enough to get on top of this and find solutions that work for all parties. If that means slowing AI, so be it.