US retailers brace for potential pain from a longshoremen’s strike

AP Business Writer

If roughly 45,000 U.S. longshoremen make good on their threat to strike beginning Tuesday, they could shut down 36 ports from Maine to Texas that handle about half the goods shipped into and out of the United States. A strike that lasts several weeks would force businesses to pay shippers for the delays, and some goods could arrive too late for the peak of the holiday shopping season. The U.S. Maritime Alliance, which represents shippers and ports, and the longshoremen’s union haven’t met since June. And no talks are scheduled. The union is demanding significantly higher wages and a total ban on the automation of cranes, gates and moving containers in the loading and unloading of freight.