This post was originally published on The Economic Times
When a dockworkers union broke off contract talks with management in June, raising the likelihood of a strike at more than a dozen ports on the East and Gulf coasts that could severely disrupt the supply chain this fall, it was not over wages, pensions or working conditions. It was about a gate through which trucks enter a small port in Mobile, Alabama.
The International Longshoremen’s Association, which has more than 47,000 members, said it had discovered that the gate was using technology to check and let in trucks without union workers, which it said violated its labor contract.
“We will never allow automation to come into our union and try to put us out of work as long as I’m alive,” said Harold J. Daggett, the union’s president and chief negotiator in talks with the United States Maritime Alliance, a group of companies that move cargo at ports.
The ILA, which represents workers at economically crucial ports in New Jersey, Virginia, Georgia and Texas, has long resisted automation because it can lead to job losses.
Longshoremen have grim memories of how past innovation reduced employment at the
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