Hundreds of requests for details on the specifics of the container shipping backlog. So, I spent 3 days calling sources, digging for details and gathering information on the substantive issue at hand. The epicenter of the problem is not what is being outlined by financial media, corporate media and politicians who have a specific interest in distracting from the issues at hand.
This has nothing to do with COVID-19.
The issues being discussed today relate to events that happened a long time ago. As a matter of fact, it was so predictable that Amazon, Walmart, UPS, FedEx, Samsung, The Home Depot and Target all had taken actions years ago -long before COVID- because they knew this day would come. It was not accidental that those companies showed up at the White House to discuss the issue, because there’s now a full court press to hide it.
There is one very specific regional issue driving the problem. Read on:
The trucking issue with California LA ports, ie the Port of Los Angeles (POLA) and the Port of Long Beach (POLB), is that all semi tractors have to be current with new California emissions standards. As a consequence, that mean trucks cannot be older than 3 years if they are to pick up or deliver containers at those ports. This issue wipes out approximately half of the fleet trucks used to move containers in/out of the port. Operating the port 24/7 will not cure the issue, because all it does is pile up more containers that sit idle as they await a limited number of trucks to pick them up.
THIS is the central issue.
On October 16, 2020, the EPA reached a settlement agreement with California Air Resource Board (CARB) to shut down semi tractor rigs that were non-compliant with new California emission standards:
2020 SAN FRANCISCO – “Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced settlements with three interstate trucking companies imposing $417,000 in penalties for violating the California Air Resources Board’s federally enforceable Truck and Bus Regulation, Drayage Truck Regulation and Transport Refrigeration Unit Regulation.
“As trucks are one of the largest sources of air pollution in California, EPA will continue to ensure these heavy-duty vehicles have the needed pollution-control equipment and operate in compliance with the rules,”
said EPA Pacific Southwest Regional Administrator John Busterud. “These companies have agreed to bring their trucks into compliance and operate more cleanly in all communities they serve.”
As noted, years ago the private sector predicted this would happen, and they started taking actions to protect their supply chains. What these massive corporations did to reduce their exposure to supply chain disruption was to immediately formulate plans to divert their goods to other ports. This was a very expensive shift in supply chain and logistic efforts for these massive corporations, which includes: Amazon, Walmart, UPS, FedEx, Samsung, The Home Depot and Target.
A long time before and during the era of the Trump administration, those massive multinational corporations knew they would need to redirect their import cargo quickly to avoid the bottleneck caused by California’s new emission standards. They began organizing new destination ports for their products and began setting up new hubs and distribution networks to avoid the predictable California port bottlenecks.
Obviously, for politically correct reasons; and in an effort to avoid the woke mob of environmentalist jackboots, the corporations didn’t publicly share any of the issues they could foresee coming – they just worked independently and quietly to avoid the issue.
No amount of extra productivity in working the docks to off-load ships will solve the issue of trucks that cannot pick up the containers and distribute them toward manufacturing or warehouses.
Via. Sundance of TLR
So, California is now allowed to bottleneck the entire nation’s goods, with their demented regulations. There is nothing that this administration does that they do not screw up. This is not bad management; this is the state of California and the Biden Administration inflicting pain on the rest of America. Why cannot federal laws be used to fight this problem; it is an attack on interstate commerce. Blue states create problems so they can transform this country fundamentally.
Look at any liberal city and you realize they cannot govern, California, New York, Chicago they are all disasters economically and because of crime. These people pride themselves on being the first to institute moralistic, heroic-sounding ideas, as if they are saving the planet. But, they never consider the ramifications, outcome or even what will replace the common sense practices. So many Democrats are devoid of logic or reality.
Today’s Editorial Cartoon by A. F. Branco
