Wrong Occupation

What Happens When Dock Workers Don’t RSVP

When Occupy Wall Street protesters attempted to shut down West Coast ports earlier this month, they didn’t do much–except demonstrate their ignorance of how ports, and their community of workers, manage the business of moving containers in and out of the United States.

Failed protests are common at the ports. In 2006 and 2007, truck drivers wanted people to know about their sorry existence moving cargo from the port to warehouses or vice versa–a process known as drayage. Most of the truckers were self-employed, not necessarily by choice, and earned less …