A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
Some 25,000 dockworkers at ports from Boston to Houston could be within a few days of walking off the job. Their union contract with shipping companies and port operators expires Monday, and NPR's Andrea Hsu tells us they seem far away from a deal on a new contract.
ANDREA HSU, BYLINE: Every day, billions of dollars' worth of goods flow through the East Coast and Gulf Coast ports that would be shut down by a strike - agricultural products, pharmaceuticals, clothes, shoes, toys for the holidays. The dockworkers want to be paid more to move the containers holding those goods. After all, they say, it's tough, dangerous work. And...
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HAROLD DAGGETT: These companies are making billions of dollars. They should take us along.
HSU: That's Harold Daggett, president of the International Longshoreman's Association, in a video posted by the union. The companies he's talking about are big ocean carriers like Maersk, Evergreen, MSC - all foreign companies.
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DAGGETT: Note one of them belongs to America.
HSU: Those companies and the port operators are represented here by the U.S. Maritime Alliance. The alliance says it's offered the union industry-leading wage increases. Daggett calls their offer insulting, and not only that. He says the port operators have another agenda.
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DAGGETT: They want to come into America and build fully automated terminals and get rid of American jobs - good-paying jobs that support families with medical, pensions, annuities. They want to get rid of them.
HSU: In fact, that's not what the U.S. Maritime Alliance has said. They've offered to keep the same restrictive language around technology that's in the current contract. The use of even partly automated equipment must be negotiated. But the union fears what's happened elsewhere. Other countries, even ports on the West Coast, use more advanced technology to move containers. Daggett has vowed, not here.
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DAGGETT: You got to draw the line.
HSU: West Coast ports have seen their traffic increase in recent months in part because some goods are already being diverted, but diverting all the traffic is unrealistic.
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GEORGE GOLDMAN: Our desire is to have a resolution.
HSU: George Goldman, who heads the North America division of the French shipping company CMA CGM, spoke at the Port of Los Angeles last week.
GOLDMAN: One day is too long of a shutdown. The moment you close the door, things begin to back up.
HSU: More than 170 industry groups signed an open letter asking the Biden administration to intervene. The White House says while it's encouraging the parties to negotiate in good faith, it's not considering federal action to break a strike.
Andrea Hsu, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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