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* USA - UNIONIZING TRUCKERS at L.A. & Long Beach Ports ?
* California - Teamsters persist in drive to unionize truckers at L.A. and Long Beach ports
(Photo by Brittany Murray/Press Telegram - Trucks back up into a virtual parking lot on the westbound Gerald Desmond Bridge in this 2009 file photo due to a new toll system that some drivers had not yet signed up for and were then turned away from terminals until they got the proper card) 
Los Angeles,CAL,USA -Daily Breeze, by Brian Sumers -5 April 2013: -- For decades, the docks at the twin ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach have been organized labor strongholds, dominated by the powerful International Longshore and Warehouse Union. But as dockworkers have negotiated lucrative contracts, other workers handling imports and exports have mostly been left out. That includes most of the truck drivers who haul goods to and from port terminals to rail yards, stores and warehouses, many of them in the Inland Empire... But that may be changing. For six years, officials with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters have been quietly laying the groundwork for an ambitious truck driver organizing campaign, one that could change the economics of the industrial supply chain... And recently, in part because the union agreed to its first contract with an employer in January, officials have become more open about their intentions... Teamsters officials estimate as many as 90 percent of drivers are considered independent contractors - not company employees - and federal law makes it impossible for contractors to form a union. (A spokesman for the trucking industry called that estimate high, saying 70 to 80 percent of drivers are contractors)... That means before the Teamsters can achieve success, they must persuade trucking firms to change how they conduct business. Trucking companies have balked at that, with many executives saying the independent contractor model - in which drivers own or lease their trucks - is more appropriate. Teamsters officials insist most of the contractor relationships are illegal... The Teamsters have responded by pressuring state and federal regulators to audit port trucking firms...
posted by Unknown @ 6:13 AM
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