Freelance Columnist
https://twitter.com/stphnmaher
Stephen Maher
Freelance Columnist
Stephen Maher is an award-winning investigative journalist, a Harvard Nieman fellow, and the author of three novels. He has a BA in international development studies from the University of Kings College in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He has lived in Jamaica, Japan, France, and the United States, and has traveled widely around the world, sometimes on his own sailboat. He speaks French and is working on Spanish.
Sep 26, 2024
Workers and port authorities on the East and Gulf Coasts of the United States are headed for a potential strike on Oct. 1, which poses a huge threat to American businesses, and a political problem for the government of Joe Biden.
Businesses have already been scrambling with alternative routes to avoid pre-Christmas supply chain problems as 47,000 eastern dockworkers press their employers for bigger wage packages. A similar showdown on the West Coast ended with a contract last year after workers staged slowdowns but no strike. Now eastern workers are seeking similar gains.
Any work stoppage could cost the US economy up to $5 billion a day, creating an enormous headache for Biden and Democratic nominee Kamala Harris during the crucial last weeks of the presidential campaign. It would put Biden in a difficult position, since he would be loath to either order workers back to the job, which would anger unions, or let the economy go into a headspin, which would anger everyone else.
