1 - American Memory

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Ciompletlon of two large Honolulu ofSce buildings was held up, for instance, and
the resultant loss of rentals was serious. A hospital was forced to postpone its
opening date because the dock strike delayed arrival of certain construction
materials necessary for the building's completion. With conditions so uncertain,
developers became hesitant to put new projects out for bid. One large construc-
tion company reported $18 million in lost revenue and $1.5 million in lost profits.
Its employees lost $10 million In wages. A construction materials supplier re-
ported profits before taxes down 225 percent from normal, a substantial loss.
Profits were down 20 percent for an equipment dealer, 20 percent for a general
contracting firm, and 28 percent for one concrete accessories firm.
Hawaii's vital sugar and pineapple export Industries suffer great financial
losses during prolonged shipping strlko^- because they cannot get their products
to market. Even in normal times, the returns on sugar and pineapple are below
acceptable rates. Failure to supply their very competitive markets—as in the
1971-72 dock strike—results in lost customers, further deteriorating the Indna-
tries' financial health.
Our pineapple industry markets 80 percent of Its annual pack through West
Coast ports, and the remaining 20 iiercent by way of Atlantic and Gulf ports. The
1971 West Coast dock strike caught the industry during the peak canning season,
and millions of cases of pineapple backed up here, unable to find their way to
market. One company had more than 9 million cases stored In warhouses at one
time. A load was sent by chartered sMp to the East Coast and hauled back over-
land to CaUfomia to preserve that Important market. Such storage, extra han-
dling, and detoured transportation cost one company a million dollars.
National policy allows foreign pineapple to come into this country duty-free,
but U.S. pineapple Is kept out of foreign markets by high tariffs. The only place
that Hawaii's high-cost pineapple industry can compete is on the Mainland. But
when shipments are temporarily cut off by a transportation Interruption, con-
sumers buy other canned fruits or foreign pineapple, and those customers may
be lost to us forever. It is no wonder that pineapple is a dying Industry in
Hawaii.
The sugar industry also had serious problems during the 1971 dock strike.
Loss of markets has been of deep concern to the Industry because it sells most
of its sugar in the Western states where sugar production Is In surplus. If the
supply of sugar from Hawaii is cut off. industrial users can easily get their
requirements from others, and this lost business is not easily won back. Then
Hawaii is forced to ship Its produce further east, and added transportation cost
reduces margins. A transportation interruption truly reduces sugar's com-
petitiveness.
During the 1971 strike, emergency sugar storage proved Insufflclent, and some
of the production had to be stored outdoors under tarpaulin. More than 91,000
tons of raw sugar and 10,000 tons of molasses were in supplemental storage at the
peak of the strike. Storage was eased to some extent by chartering ships to Gulf
and East Coast ports and to Vancouver, from where the sugar was railed to the
California refinery—but the added expense was enormous. The industry reported
that extra costs resulting from the strike totaled close to $6 million.
Next to suffer from the effects of transportation stoppages are Hawaii's wage
earners, who.se jobs disappear as the economy winds down. The impact on jobs
is not Immediate. Supplies on hand at the beginning of a strike can keep busi-
nesses operating normally for a while, and even when supplies begin to run out,
employers try to keep workers on the payroll by shortening hours or by schedul-
ing vacations during the slack period. But when the stoppage lasts more than
two or three months, the number of people thrown out of work accelerates. What-
ever gains are won by the strikers when the strike ends, the wages lost by these
nonparticipants can never be recovered.
The worst spell of unemployment In Hawaii's modern history followed the
longest dock strike in Hawaii's history. The Islands' unemployment rate was
already up to 7 percent in 1949 as a result of the ongoing national recession.
But the 177-day shutdown of local docks in May-October 1949 sent unemploy-
ment skyrocketing to over 32,000 workers—nearly 17 percent of the labor force
at that time.
The second worst spell of unemployment In Hawaii's modem history followed
the .second longest dock strike. More than 23,000 workers were on the jobless
rolls in November 1971, following the first 100 days of the West Coast dock
strike. When the strike was resumed in January-February 1972, unemployment
rose to 23,650 workers in February. This gave Hawaii an unemployment rate of