[00:00:00] [SPEAKER_00]: Hey everybody, I was going to save some of this for tomorrow, but I want to give you this message because I was talking about the strike with Jeff Dornick from The Jeff Dornick Show on the show today, and I wanted to give you a few more bullet points to consider on the happenings around the contracts, okay?
[00:00:18] [SPEAKER_00]: Okay, the automation issue, I think, and the wage are being manipulated as a sort of like, well, we can all certainly understand where they're at with all of this talking points because they don't want the strikers on the East Coast to be demonized, okay?
[00:00:33] [SPEAKER_00]: But let me explain just a little bit more because, I don't know, something to consider.
[00:00:39] [SPEAKER_00]: The timing, I think, was planned. I think this was calculated, manipulated. The contract is up, you know, October.
[00:00:45] [SPEAKER_00]: And yes, it's a six-year contract, but keep this in mind too. The West Coast did their, so the West Coast did their 13-month talk, okay?
[00:00:55] [SPEAKER_00]: They had the talks on raising their wage and concluded talks to a 13% increase in 2023.
[00:01:03] [SPEAKER_00]: Their contract was up in 2022 on the West Coast, okay?
[00:01:07] [SPEAKER_00]: And so a year later, they worked without wages. They didn't strike. They worked without wages to come to an agreement on pay.
[00:01:14] [SPEAKER_00]: But they didn't just get a regular pay increase. They got a 32% increase. Then on top of that, they got a COVID bonus.
[00:01:23] [SPEAKER_00]: And on top of that, they got retroactive to the original contract that ended in 2022.
[00:01:28] [SPEAKER_00]: So a whole year's worth of back pay, okay, on their increase.
[00:01:33] [SPEAKER_00]: A 32% increase is not normal in any way, shape, or form, okay?
[00:01:38] [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm sure they were very happy about it.
[00:01:41] [SPEAKER_00]: They get this huge walloping 32% increase, okay?
[00:01:47] [SPEAKER_00]: Now, think about this. The Biden administration, they say, did, of course, step in to help the International Longshore and Warehouse Union and the Pacific Maritime Association, because we're talking about the West Coast,
[00:02:01] [SPEAKER_00]: resolve their labor negotiations in 2023 after the contract expired in 2022.
[00:02:09] [SPEAKER_00]: After the contract expired, those workers did not have the wage increase in place but were in talks.
[00:02:16] [SPEAKER_00]: There wasn't a strike. There wasn't really talk of a strike that I know about anyway.
[00:02:20] [SPEAKER_00]: And the workers on the West Coast worked without that contract for a solid year for them to figure that out and then got this walloping, huge, amazing bonus of a life to 32% increase.
[00:02:34] [SPEAKER_00]: Have you ever had a 32% increase before? I think this was very planned. Why? Because then it gets the East Coast.
[00:02:41] [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, my gosh, they got that? Well, here we come. We want this increase, right? And we also want to use automation.
[00:02:49] [SPEAKER_00]: I think automation is more of a ruse because you're not going to stop automation. It's coming.
[00:02:53] [SPEAKER_00]: And you don't see anybody else working against that. You don't see any other union groups getting out there just to fight automation, okay?
[00:03:00] [SPEAKER_00]: So I think it's padded in there because they know most of the country doesn't want automation.
[00:03:04] [SPEAKER_00]: They know we're against it.
[00:03:06] [SPEAKER_00]: So I want to leave that with you because it's just a little more, right?
[00:03:10] [SPEAKER_00]: It's just a little more added facts to this story that I think are very suspicious, okay?
[00:03:17] [SPEAKER_00]: And just wanted to leave that with you. Thanks, guys.