Harbor Truck Drivers Oppose Being Treated as Sharecroppers on Wheels

Trade agreements have helped facilitate a 32% increase in containerized trade at U.S. ports in just the last three years. Businesses, particularly major retail and manufacturing companies, depend on the efficient and safe delivery of their products through the global supply chain to their customers. Ninety-five percent of goods pass through our maritime ports, placing tremendous pressure on the nation’s port terminal operating, steamship carrier, and port trucking companies to expand capacity to meet increasing demand. While the 60,000 truck drivers who move intermodal containers into and out of our ports are a critical link in the movement of goods, they face terrible working conditions that have troubling implications for both the success of trade and the safety of our ports and highways. 

Port truck drivers are liable for transporting goods but have no rights

Most port truck drivers have scraped together a few thousand dollars to buy an old rig. They are then hired as independent contractors, instead of as employees, by the harbor motor carriers. This means they are not covered by employment laws, and have no power to improve their employment standards because they have no legal right to organize a union. Working conditions have spiraled downward, making port drivers sharecroppers on wheels, and resulting in severe driver shortages:

• The driver turnover rate is estimated at 136% per year. (American Trucking Association survey of trucking companies 4Q2005)
• Drivers are generally paid by the container load instead of by an hourly wage or by the mile.
• Recent research at the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports found only 10% of drivers had any health insurance and only 5% had retirement benefits. (The Labor Market for Port Drivers in Southern California,” Kristen Monaco, Cal State Univ. at Long Beach, Aug. 30, 2005)
• Drivers have poverty-level earnings with median income of $25,000 after truck expenses. (“The Labor Market for Port Drivers in Southern California,” Kristen Monaco, Cal State Univ. at Long Beach, Aug. 30, 2005)
• Many drivers are on the brink of bankruptcy.

High driver turnover and instability put ports at risk for security lapses

The financial condition of port drivers is a security concern because of the sensitivity of their work in having direct access to intermodal containers coming into and from the maritime ports. Extreme turnover among drivers and the hundreds of small trucking companies make meaningful background checks virtually impossible and leave drivers and small trucking companies in the system vulnerable to exploitation and blackmail. Further, port authorities and terminal operators are not held accountable for trucking services because there is a patchwork of license and registration requirements for harbor trucking companies and drivers, which creates loopholes in the security network. Consequently, there is a looming security problem facing our nation’s maritime ports. 

While the security debate has focused on enhancing the technology that screens containers coming into the United States from foreign ports, missing from this debate has been how ensuring quality jobs for those who handle containerized freight can improve port security. The system seems designed to allow the most powerful actors at the ports – government, terminal operators, steamship lines and motor carriers – to pass the responsibility for security to one another. In order to strengthen the chain of accountability for port security, state and local port authorities must set standards to ensure that stable, legitimate employers compete on a level playing field in the port trucking market.

Change to Win and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters are partnering to improve ports protection by raising the job and security standards for truck drivers at our nation’s ports. The campaign will work in coalition with public officials, port communities, security experts, environmentalists and enlightened port industry stakeholders.