Posted on 11/09/2021 1:46:58 AM PST by Libloather
The California business community has an idea for easing the supply chain crisis: Suspend recent labor-friendly laws affecting warehouse workers and independent contractors.
Businesses say they will be able to move goods more quickly if the state suspends the 2019 law that requires companies to provide more workers with employment benefits. Ditto for the law that prevents warehouses from enforcing quotas that limit people’s ability to take bathroom breaks.
Nineteen state business organizations argued those points in their Oct. 19 letter to Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Newsom and labor interests strongly disagree.
“Getting rid of bathroom breaks for warehouse workers, and suspending a regulation that doesn’t even apply to truckers, are not solutions,” said Newsom spokesman Alex Stack.
Unions say that the supply chain crisis stems in part from decades of low pay and bad working conditions many truckers and warehouse workers have faced, issues they maintain won’t be resolved quickly.
Experts agree there’s no easy solution to the short-term crisis. Demand is up and inventories tend to be low, as consumers are unleashing pent-up demand while companies that cut back during the COVID pandemic are trying to keep up.
“The simple answer to this crisis is people simply stop buying stuff but that’s not going to happen,” said Assemblyman Patrick O’Donnell, D-Long Beach, chairman of the joint Ports and Good Movement Committee.
(Excerpt) Read more at sacbee.com ...
> “The simple answer to this crisis is people simply stop buying stuff but that’s not going to happen,”
Contrast this to the remonstrations about the Trump tariffs.
I thought the biggest problem at the ports was insisting the truck be green compliant...which sidelined a lot of drivers.
Still doesn’t explain why my store is regularly out of products made here...like tabasco, among other things not dependent on cargo ships.
No truck older than 10 years is allowed at the docks I’ve read.
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