Thousands of dockworkers across the U.S. East Coast and Gulf Coast are officially on strike after negotiations between their union and an alliance of employers failed.
- Imports: cars and auto parts, agricultural products like bananas, machinery, fabricated steel, furniture, apparel and more will be affected. Exports: cars and auto parts, pharmaceutical products, wine and spirits, beef, pork, poultry, eggs, wood, plastics, holiday goods like toys, seafood, and other products or commodities.
- Approximately 50,000 ILA union longshoremen were walking off the job at East Coast and Gulf Coast ports from New England to Texas starting at 12:01 a.m. ET on October 1 after failing to reach an agreement with ports ownership on a new contract, the union’s first strike since 1977.
- Between 43%-49% of all U.S. imports and billions of dollars in trade monthly move through the U.S East Coast and Gulf ports.
- The International Longshoreman’s Association, the largest maritime union in North America, rejected an offer from the port management group USMX on Monday that included a wage hike over six years near 50%.
Thirty-six East and Gulf coast ports shut down as 45,000 union workers walked off the job after labor negotiations stalled between the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) and the United States Maritime Alliance (USMX). The strike only exacerbates some temporary port closures in places like Florida, the Carolinas and Georgia in the wake of Hurricane Helene.
The ILA strike is the first at these ports since 1977 and has the potential to cost the economy up to $5 billion a day, upend holiday shopping for millions of Americans and dictate whether many small- and medium-sized businesses and farmers turn a profit or lose money this year, experts said.
“Every idle day that a ship does not get into the port costs money and sometimes a lot of money…that ultimately gets passed onto consumers,” said Stamatis Tsantanis, chairman and chief executive of shipper Seanergy Maritime and United Maritime, in a statement.
In a last-ditch effort on Monday to avert a strike that will cause significant harm to the U.S. economy if it is lengthy — at least hundreds of millions of dollars a day at the largest ports like New York/New Jersey — the USMX offered a nearly 50% wage hike over six years, but that was rejected by the ILA, according to a source close to the negotiations. The port ownership group said it hoped the offer would lead to a resumption of collective bargaining.
The 14 ports where preparations for a strike have been underway are Boston, New York/New Jersey, Philadelphia, Wilmington, North Carolina, Baltimore, Norfolk, Charleston, Savannah, Jacksonville, Tampa, Miami, New Orleans, Mobile, and Houston.