West Coast ports facing shutdown in labor dispute

[sheltiedave]

OSHA cannot take care of the inherent dangers.

OSHA also has no control over the slippage, which is what occurs when management wants workers to start cutting corners, and accepting a higher level of risk, by driving production higher and higher. This is such a high risk job that a tremendous amount of time motion studies have been conducted, and everyone involved, from the shipbound longshoremen, the pickers, setters, swingers, spotters, logistics, and clerks all have a specific range of production they have to hit every day. More production either means more hours, or reducing time spent setting up every critical lift.

Management wants slippage to trend up, union folks want the status quo with more hazard pay, the fleet just wants to get offloaded with minimal dead wait time so they can go run another cycle. And management wants to automate as much as possible, so they don't have to pay anyone money, which represents an uncontrolled variant cost.

These clerks and longshoremen are rock stars, and they get paid accordingly. I have seen work schedulers at nuclear fuel production plants paid on a similar scale. When you have an entire industry that depends on you getting things right, every single hour and every single day, you become a rainman.