Category Archives: Labor Economics

Cabotage laws cover 85% of world’s coastlines

Posted on October 1, 2025 by just2bruce | Leave a comment

Cabotage refers to laws or regulations that insist that national carriers transport freight or passengers within a country. A new publication indicates it is becoming more prevalent.

Cabotage in the US has been a feature of air travel for many years; it’s why we don’t see foreign airlines flying US domestic routes. But it’s perhaps more important in the case of ocean freight. For instance, Hawaii needs to have US ships transport goods. Same with Puerto Rico.

The principal argument for cabotage is to protect a nation’s logistics capacity when there’s an outside threat. That includes having trained seafarers, and a supply of vehicles or ships under control of a nation’s firms.

Cabotage has been around for centuries. Great Britain in the 1700s and 1800s had strict cabotage laws as did most other European powers of the day; France, Spain, Portugal. The laws varied, but violations of them were considered piracy. It’s hard to enforce such laws everywhere on a coastline. During the 1700s and 1800s Ireland and France did a brisk trade under the radar; recall that the Irish were not happy about British supremacy there.

In the US cabotage requires building of ships in the US, so it supports the US shipbuilding industry. It also ensures that military cargoes have US ships to carry them in case of war, as well as some trained hands for the ships.

How effective it is for these purposes is not clear, as the number of US citizen mariners has been declining for years now. It’s not that attractive a profession for many; a hard life, and constantly traveling. As a veteran of a maritime academy faculty, I am well aware of the difficulty of getting students to choose this kind of education.

It seems that most nations have cabotage laws now. The report mentioned in the story indicates a large percentage of coastlines are affected by cabotage restrictions of various kinds, with over 105 nations reporting cabotage restrictions.

The new publication is the second edition of Cabotage Laws of the World, by Hilton Staniland and Deirdre Fitzpatrick. The latter is the CEO of Seafarers Rights International (SRI), an important organization in the maritime community.

Sam Chambers October 1, 2025

https://splash247.com/cabotage-laws-now-cover-85-of-worlds-coastlines/

Kenyan driver rumors plague Werner Trucking

Posted on September 23, 2025 by just2bruce | Leave a comment

Nebraska, the home state of Werner, has made a deal with Kenya to get workers from there. The reason given is to make more truck drivers available.

Werner got caught up in the flak because they hosted a meeting between the Nebraska Secretary of State and a Kenyan delegation. The topic was supposedly an economic cooperation deal. But both Kenyan and Nebraska officials have said that acquiring Kenyan truck drivers was one of the objectives.

Werner managment claimed on X that they have no plans to hire Kenyan drivers and are not part of the deal. But other Nebraska trucking firms have said they would be interested.

I’ve met Derek Leathers, CEO of Werner, and if he says Werner will not hire Kenyan drivers, I believe him.

But my question is, where does Nebraska get off making arrangements to bring foreign workers into the US? The oft-repeated policy of the US government is to deport foreign workers, and the rationale is that they take jobs from Americans. Why are these workers an exception?

Now I support allowing immigration; we have an aging workforce, we are becoming a nation of retired people. Our younger generations tend to want jobs that offer a better lifestyle than factory or repetitive jobs. Truck driving doesn’t offer any lifestyle advantages for most folks, and many of our trucking firms have often routinely taken advantage of drivers.

But truck driving is essential to our economy and our businesses. So we need drivers, just as we need agricultural workers, construction workers, landscapers, and those who can perform other hard jobs. Immigrant workers pay taxes and spend cash in American businesses. It’s good for all.

John Kingston Wednesday, September 10, 2025

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/werner-faces-social-media-storm-over-kenyan-driver-rumors

Labor disruption coming for supply chains

Posted on August 20, 2024 by just2bruce | Leave a comment

Now is the time for labor unions to press ports and railways for new benefits for workers. There is a perfect storm of labor stoppages about to take place.

Thursday (that’s two days from this writing) the Teamsters Canada union (TCRC) expects to strike the CPKC railroad, one of the two largest in Canada. CPKC is also a large US and Mexico railway, and we’ve yet to see if US unions will honor a Canadian strike. The Canadian National (CN) rail line has blocked the strike by giving a lockout notice to the union. So there’s a high likelihood that most Canadian rail shipments will be shut down later this week.

The TCRC has turned down offers made in January, April and May. The labor agreements with the rails expired at the end of 2023, and the workers are working under the old contract. There have also been some rules changes by the government to reduce fatigue, that are not accounted for in the contracts. In fact, the union claims the rails want to ‘gut the collective agreement of all safety-critical fatigue provisions’. That may be hyperbole, but it’s indicative of the bitterness of disagreement.

The Teamsters represent about 10,000 workers. The Labor Minister has not issued an order for binding arbitration, so it’s likely there will be stoppages.

The cessation of rail movements means there are likely to be major disruptions at ports, where rail takes goods into the interior of Canada and also to the US. The rails are already announcing embargos which mean that they will not accept new shipments in certain areas because of expected port congestion.

The Port of Vancouver has already ordered ships on their way there to slow-steam because they fear they will not be able to move cargo out or into the port.

To top off the labor confusion, the US East Coast Ports are engaged in negotiations with the International Longshoremens Association (ILA), the major union representing 85,000 members. The ILA has indicated that October 1 will begin a strike if a new contract is not agreed. There does not seem to be a clear path to agreement.

Shippers and Ocean Carriers are already preparing. Cargo is shifting to the West Coast US Ports, where an agreement was completed last year. I expect the East Coast ILA members expect similar if not better contracts, because East Coast ports have been prospering for the last couple of years. Their first glitch was when the Panama Canal reduced its traffic due to an extended drought. Traffic started shifting to the West Coast then. Now the Panama Canal is near its former levels, and traffic is rising again. The East Coast Ports do not need a strike right now.

But that’s exactly why the unions are playing hardball.

We’ll see how it plays out.