The Oregonian and the Unions

The Oregonian’s Saturday, February 22, banner headline, is Paychecks for not working – eye-catching, inflammatory and unsurprising given The Oregonian’s known antipathy for unions.  Full disclosure would include that these longshoremen are not among the usual whipping boys of public sector unions.  So this particular “outrage” does not involve tax money which is typically the hook to demonize PERS and all those miscreant retired teachers and custodians slurping at the public trough.

No, this particular contract is between capitalists and workers.  The poor gullible taxpayers, naively guaranteeing their public workers a retirement are not a party to these shenanigans.   Presumably tough-minded parties, the International Warehouse Union  and the Pacific Maritime Association (“which represents West Coast cargo carriers, terminal operators and stevedores that employ dockworkers”) stared each other down, eyeball to eyeball across that no-man’s-land expanse of the bargaining table.  They ruthlessly and

cynically traded pawns in an unrelenting pursuit of each of their own self-interests.  Out of this bloody struggle came the contract, such as it was.

Apparently, according to the report, there is at least one participant among the Pacific Maritime Association (the Marubeni grain elevator owned by Columbia Grain Inc.) which “has aggressively locked out the workforce and is not offering any work.  Still any displaced worker is required to accept other work throughout the port before being eligible for PGP.”

Which brings us to the PGP – Pay Guarantee Plan – which seems to be the kernel issue that rubs the Oregonian the wrong way. The longshoremen – shrewdly, cynically, and selfishly – fooled the naïve maritime association into agreeing to the plan.  The union also shrewdly, cynically, and selfishly diminished the chances of a strike or the need to use union dues to amass a huge strike fund.  Under the plan, senior union members “could be eligible for guaranteed pay if work wasn’t available at other terminals.”

The longshoremen, in bargaining with their employers, were able to protect their livelihoods and the security of their family within the parameters of their contract.  Who knows: They may have protected themselves in the medium-term only to have shot themselves in the foot in the long-term.  The Oregonian reports, “Grain terminal owners also could lack incentive to settle the dispute because they are able to load ships using fewer workers than the number required by previous longshore union contracts.”  In about ten years the labor economists might be able to tell us who “won” this particular skirmish. 

In the meantime, thanks to The Oregonian for getting my attention, providing the fine-print, and convincing me even more that unions are one of the few remaining ways working people have to protect their security and their livelihoods.