It is quite clear to many that the Democrat Party of 2024 dislikes economic stability and or economic prosperity, except for their chosen few. It is also quite clear that the Democrat Party of 2024 dislikes the working men and women of this country. Lastly, it certainly appears to many that the Democrat Party of 2024 has a great desire to inflict as much pain and suffering it can on these same working men and women of our economy and those on fixed incomes by their robust endorsement of the (now-delayed) strike by the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) at all of the thirty-six (36) Eastern and Gulf Coast ports in our country.
According to official accounts, this strike is centered on the apparent minuscule pay and benefits that the ILA earns. The Longshoremen are demanding a 77% pay increase over six years that will raise the base hourly wage for its members from $39 to $69 over this period. It has been reported by the Port of New York and New Jersey Regulator of the Waterfront Commission of New York Harbor that more than half of 3,726 dockworkers earned more than $150,000 a year in Fiscal 2020, with almost one in five earning over $250,000 a year. The report also stated: "Based on the industry's reported figures, the Commission has again identified over 590 individuals who collectively received over $147.6 million dollars last year in outsized salaries, or for hours they never worked." (https://www.thecentersquare.com/national/article_b6346692-801e-11ef-be8b-3fc6dd725881.html)
The ILA is led by a Runyon-esque man named Harold Daggett. A recent video of Mr. Daggett posted on social media quoted him as stating, “I will cripple you” in reference what this strike would do to the United States economy. Why does Mr. Daggett want to "cripple" us and the economy? Did we as taxpaying citizens do something to upset this "leader" of the ILA union? The same leader who owns a 7,000 square foot home, drives a Bentley, earns over $910,000 a year as head of the union and recently sold his yacht (https://nypost.com/2024/10/02/business/harold-daggetts-sprawling-nj-mansion-has-bentley-5-car-garage-and-guest-house/). One can argue that he is far removed from the legal working middle class citizens of our country and economy. But hey! He wants to "cripple" us and our economy and has the blessing of President Biden and Vice President Harris along with the Democrat Party.
Curiously, President Biden has also stated that he would have not invoked the Taft-Hartley Act to end the strike in using an 80-day cooling off period, where both sides would have gone back to the negotiating table without fanfare or attention. The strike, if it had continued, would have cost our economy untold billions upon billions of dollars, and would have created a new round of inflation.
Thus, this type of strike may be a difficult concept for some non-ILA union members to support since those union members do not make an extremely high salary. Inflation is the same for these ILA members making their high salaries as compared to their much lower income non-ILA union members and for those non-union, non-special employees who toil daily in our economy. The ILA arguments of its "travesty of economic justice" are falling on deaf ears especially for those citizens of our country who have lost everything they own and worked for from Hurricane Helene, especially as they starve and die at the feet of an uncaring government. Since the ILA controls labor contracts on the docks, any innovation that could make the docks more efficient and thus lower the costs of the products shipped to the docks, could be passed on to consumers in the form of lower costs. But jobs must be justified, so that type of innovation is forbidden. The union still demands guarantees of “no modernization nor automation” to preserve these above equilibrium jobs for its 50,000 plus members and for its leaders, much like the “rubber room” strategy employed by the United Auto Workers years back, with such strategy having a great hand in the collapse of the domestic auto industry in 2009.
Of course, no analysis of labor and management relations can be complete without commentary as to what the labor and management relationships are like in Connecticut. Connecticut! A state that is owned by its public unions. A state where 40% of the state budget goes to pay municipal pensions, with most of the retirees now residing in other tax-free jurisdictions. A state where Democrat politicians marched in an Omni Hotel picket line for a “photo op” effectively destroying that picket in embarrassment, leaving labor to solve their own situation without this useless “political support.” A state where the Lt. Governor Susan Bysiewicz defiantly said on X that she would have “done the same (picket) thing all over again” after the Omni debacle, showing absolutely no regard for her poor plebian subjects. Connecticut! A state where Covid money somehow always ends up in union coffers. And a state where the poisoned educational unions continue to dilute and ruin education. My friend and colleague Tony De Angelo describes labor and management relations as a “board game” in Connecticut, however I respectfully disagree with Tony in that it is only a game if both players have an equal chance of winning.
Maybe just maybe in 2024 it is time to rethink and reevaluate an antiquated system of harbor shipping and commerce along with all the other one-sided labor dealings that are all so familiar to us. Technology runs our economy whether unions believe it or not. Just maybe, the Biden-Harris regime and their useless ideologies, toadies, lackeys, and sycophants could be set aside once since their regime began and put Americans and the American economy first. The Biden-Harris regime seems to enjoy watching legal Americans fight for their survival whether it has been an open border crisis, a human trafficking crisis, a pandemic crisis, a National Debt crisis, a runaway inflation crisis, war in the Middle East crisis, and much more. And comically this is the true record of all new and reinvented Kamala Harris. And, as a sneak preview King Governor Ned Lamont The Unaccountable or his successor will continue to feed the state union cookie monster’s financial demands in exchange for continuing votes. But while Kamala Harris will now cry victory, and we are now reprieved, we are soon headed for more deceptions, lies and a horrific way forward, as we will soon see a new port crisis of her own making regardless of who is elected.
Free America from being crippled by union and political upper crust and the illuminati that have ruined our country for many years.
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