In terms of the actual work being done, you could hardly find two occupations more dissimilar than filling prescriptions in a hospital or drug store and stevedoring the huge shipping containers that move through the country’s ports 24 hours a day.
But, ever since last spring, pharmacy workers and longshoremen on the East Coast of the U.S. have shared at least one common trait — their association with organized labor organizations whose objectives and hardball tactics too often have more to do with empowering union leaders than benefiting the rank and file.
Case in point, workers at ports from Maine to Texas staged a three-day strike the first week of October over wages and the threat posed by automation before finally settling for a 62 percent pay raise over six years.
Their union, the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA), had originally…
