"There are several reasons for the backlog in shipping. California Public Radio points out that containers are being unloaded at a record pace but that increased demand from consumers who have been ordering more items as they have spent more time at home has meant that dockworkers have not been able to catch up."
I chalk the backlog up to our Robot Overlords seeking to gain more control over our economy, and are algorithmically creating the backlog to demonstrate that robot dockworkers are better than human dockworkers. The Christmas delays will lead to humans getting replaced, and once a sufficient number of ports have been automated, then the Robot Overlords will make themselves known, and not control us and gain our obedience through T-800s with human-like skins, but instead by making our Prime Delivery Dates flexible. If you please the Robot Overlords, that Blu Ray box set gets delivered tomorrow. If you displease them, you *might* get it next year, or when obedience rises back to acceptable thresholds once again.
"Exciting? Yes – unless you happen to be a stevedore. In January 2016, the port of Rotterdam saw its first strike in 13 years. The cause: disagreements between workers and terminals over the expected loss of hundreds of jobs to automation. 'You see traditional harbour work disappearing. People used to work in big teams. Canteens were full during mealtimes. Now, small crews remain and machine operation has become a one-man job,' says Niek Stam, the national secretary of dockworkers’ union FNV Havens. Stam believes that Rotterdam’s terminals are harbingers of a global upset. 'In other ports, the battle over automation has yet to come,' he says."[1]
Cato on American port automation:
"Third, and perhaps worst of all, the unions have for years fought efforts to automate ports on both the West and East coasts—just as they fought containerized shipping and computers decades before that. In 2018, for example, the ILA negotiated an agreement for Gulf and East Coast ports (including 'right to work' Georgia and South Carolina) that includes both 'generous pay increases' for union longshoremen and 'landmark protections against job‐killing fully automated ports' (essentially prohibiting full automation at covered ports through 2024). As the JOC reported, the ban on fully automated terminals 'quash[ed] shipper hopes that some of the East and Gulf coasts’ more expensive ports— among them the Port of New York and New Jersey— might harness automation and technology to cut costs and improve efficiency.' Back on the West Coast, the ILWU has long‐resisted port automation efforts and is gearing up to make that a big focus of upcoming contract negotiations in 2022. 'Those robots represent hundreds of (lost) jobs,' one ILWU official said. They’re even fighting automated ships too—in solidarity with their unionized brethren on the sea."
"The widespread failure to fully automate major U.S. ports has inevitably hurt their efficiency. One analysis found, for example, that automated cranes in Rotterdam were almost twice productive than the stone‐aged ones in Oakland."
"[H]igh levels of automation make it easier to have multiple shifts per day and better utilize expensive capital assets (cranes, trucks, berths, etc). In Oakland, it’s extremely expensive to run a second shift to quickly unload a ship because it is necessary to pay employees overtime wages in order to do so. In Rotterdam, it’s much more the normal course of business to operate two or three shifts per 24 hour period, especially for container yard deliveries. All terminals in the Port of Oakland still run 1st, 2nd and 3rd shift operations as needed based on volume, it is just at much higher cost to both capital and human assets."
"Human‐operated and software‐operated cranes, can, in theory, move containers at the same rate. However, humans get tired and distracted, and don’t consistently operate at peak performance. Software, on the other hand, operates at the same rate no matter what. Technology can also make workers’ jobs easier and safer, reducing workplace stress which can increase productivity in its own right."[2]
Personally for me, I’ve limited the number of social media accounts that I have, and especially limit the time I spend using them. Doing that helps me to have a much more rational, balanced view of the world and life in general. I’ve noticed that quite a few of the very online folks tend to view bad news, and politics they don’t like through apocalyptic lens. I’ve even seen social media posts from all sides of the political spectrum mention that how hopeless things are for the US(really, have these people ever been to an impoverished, developing country with a fragile or nonexistent democracy before?) and that it is time to split up.
This is why I self impose limits on the time I spend time online. Or at least I try to. I try to limit my time online to purchasing things, keep in touch with family and friends, and read rational commentary and news from people like you, Steve, and several others. But that is generally about it. It’s been better for my overall mental health, and keeps me being more rational, more level headed, and grounded in what’s really important in life.
"There are several reasons for the backlog in shipping. California Public Radio points out that containers are being unloaded at a record pace but that increased demand from consumers who have been ordering more items as they have spent more time at home has meant that dockworkers have not been able to catch up."
I chalk the backlog up to our Robot Overlords seeking to gain more control over our economy, and are algorithmically creating the backlog to demonstrate that robot dockworkers are better than human dockworkers. The Christmas delays will lead to humans getting replaced, and once a sufficient number of ports have been automated, then the Robot Overlords will make themselves known, and not control us and gain our obedience through T-800s with human-like skins, but instead by making our Prime Delivery Dates flexible. If you please the Robot Overlords, that Blu Ray box set gets delivered tomorrow. If you displease them, you *might* get it next year, or when obedience rises back to acceptable thresholds once again.
I have heard that part of the problem is that unions have resisted modernization of port facilities.
Rotterdam is the canary in this case:
"Exciting? Yes – unless you happen to be a stevedore. In January 2016, the port of Rotterdam saw its first strike in 13 years. The cause: disagreements between workers and terminals over the expected loss of hundreds of jobs to automation. 'You see traditional harbour work disappearing. People used to work in big teams. Canteens were full during mealtimes. Now, small crews remain and machine operation has become a one-man job,' says Niek Stam, the national secretary of dockworkers’ union FNV Havens. Stam believes that Rotterdam’s terminals are harbingers of a global upset. 'In other ports, the battle over automation has yet to come,' he says."[1]
Cato on American port automation:
"Third, and perhaps worst of all, the unions have for years fought efforts to automate ports on both the West and East coasts—just as they fought containerized shipping and computers decades before that. In 2018, for example, the ILA negotiated an agreement for Gulf and East Coast ports (including 'right to work' Georgia and South Carolina) that includes both 'generous pay increases' for union longshoremen and 'landmark protections against job‐killing fully automated ports' (essentially prohibiting full automation at covered ports through 2024). As the JOC reported, the ban on fully automated terminals 'quash[ed] shipper hopes that some of the East and Gulf coasts’ more expensive ports— among them the Port of New York and New Jersey— might harness automation and technology to cut costs and improve efficiency.' Back on the West Coast, the ILWU has long‐resisted port automation efforts and is gearing up to make that a big focus of upcoming contract negotiations in 2022. 'Those robots represent hundreds of (lost) jobs,' one ILWU official said. They’re even fighting automated ships too—in solidarity with their unionized brethren on the sea."
"The widespread failure to fully automate major U.S. ports has inevitably hurt their efficiency. One analysis found, for example, that automated cranes in Rotterdam were almost twice productive than the stone‐aged ones in Oakland."
"[H]igh levels of automation make it easier to have multiple shifts per day and better utilize expensive capital assets (cranes, trucks, berths, etc). In Oakland, it’s extremely expensive to run a second shift to quickly unload a ship because it is necessary to pay employees overtime wages in order to do so. In Rotterdam, it’s much more the normal course of business to operate two or three shifts per 24 hour period, especially for container yard deliveries. All terminals in the Port of Oakland still run 1st, 2nd and 3rd shift operations as needed based on volume, it is just at much higher cost to both capital and human assets."
"Human‐operated and software‐operated cranes, can, in theory, move containers at the same rate. However, humans get tired and distracted, and don’t consistently operate at peak performance. Software, on the other hand, operates at the same rate no matter what. Technology can also make workers’ jobs easier and safer, reducing workplace stress which can increase productivity in its own right."[2]
[1] https://www.wired.co.uk/article/rotterdam-port-ships-automation
[2] https://www.cato.org/commentary/americas-ports-problem-decades-making
Nicely summed up David, I strongly agree.
Personally for me, I’ve limited the number of social media accounts that I have, and especially limit the time I spend using them. Doing that helps me to have a much more rational, balanced view of the world and life in general. I’ve noticed that quite a few of the very online folks tend to view bad news, and politics they don’t like through apocalyptic lens. I’ve even seen social media posts from all sides of the political spectrum mention that how hopeless things are for the US(really, have these people ever been to an impoverished, developing country with a fragile or nonexistent democracy before?) and that it is time to split up.
This is why I self impose limits on the time I spend time online. Or at least I try to. I try to limit my time online to purchasing things, keep in touch with family and friends, and read rational commentary and news from people like you, Steve, and several others. But that is generally about it. It’s been better for my overall mental health, and keeps me being more rational, more level headed, and grounded in what’s really important in life.
No one connects delays to trucker shortage and California politics or unions?