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Workers at Baton Rouge port join national dockworker strike
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BATON ROUGE - Dockworkers at the Baton Rouge port were on strike Tuesday as part of a nationwide movement.
The strike began early Tuesday over wages and automation even though progress had been reported in contract talks. The contract between the ports and about 45,000 members of the International Longshoremen’s Association expired at midnight, the Associated Press reports.
"We're not asking for anything unreal or unbelievable," one of the workers said. "We're just looking for stuff that is well due to any working person."
The strike involves 36 ports along the Gulf Coast and the East Coast and the union wants a five-dollar-an-hour pay raise each year over the next six years.
Port workers in Baton Rouge like Lyle Jones said they are not only fighting for better wages, they also want a contract that prevents the automation of their jobs.
"When you try to take a bunch of jobs away that's bad, and like I say when it comes to machinery you use it and then you want a machine to operate itself and do everything bad," Jones said.
Jim Patterson from the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry said the strike could cause the kind of domino effect of backlogs at the docks we saw during COVID-19. If it goes on for more than a week, it could be a disaster for Louisiana's businesses, manufacturers and consumers.
"An export backlog will compromise the ability of Louisiana farmers and manufacturers to obtain the prices they require from world markets to be profitable this year, and shortages and delays in imported products will adversely affect business consumers," Patterson said.
Patterson said Louisiana is one of the top three state exporters, shipping out plastics, soybeans, petroleum, food and much more. He told WBRZ the port brings in billions of dollars for the state and the strike could affect So the effect of the dozens on strike in Port Allen and more than 600 in New Orleans may be felt worldwide
"While they have stockpiled it is not enough to carry them past that first week and then we'll start seeing those destructions I was referring to earlier," Patterson said.
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