Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, a 15th century Italian scholar, wanted to know everything there was to know. No one in the 21st century can entertain such hopes unless they truly know nothing about the world. Are we lucky enough to see the American exception? (For Pico, see Henri de Lubac, Pic de la Mirandole, Paris, 1974.)
In a social media post supporting the union’s (International Longshoremen’s Association, ILA) demand to block automation in East Coast and Gulf ports, the US president-elect wrote:
There has been much discussion surrounding the “automation” of US docks. I study automation and know just about everything there is to know about automation. The amount of money saved pales in comparison to the pain, injury, and harm it causes to American workers, in this case longshore workers. Foreign companies…are making record profits, but I’d rather these foreign companies spend their profits on the greats at our docks than on expensive machinery that constantly needs replacing. That’s what I think. After all, there is no benefit for them. I hope they understand how important this is to me. Because of the great privilege of accessing our markets, these foreign companies should hire our great American workers instead of firing them and sending their profits overseas.
I don’t think the “almost” qualifier is enough to save Trump from claims of being a 21st century Pico. To know “almost everything there is to know” about automation in East Coast and Gulf ports, one must be able to answer the following questions based on sound theory and empirical research, but this is not just It’s just a question. A sample class of broad questions (hint: economics will help):
How does automation affect production functions, product prices, and the economy’s production possibilities frontier (ppf)? How does automation affect employment and real wages within and outside the industry under consideration? ?Test your understanding by applying the conclusions to, for example, American agriculture (which now accounts for about 1.5% of the labor force, down from 84% in 1810). How did automation impact the Industrial Revolution? 19 What would have happened to workers’ wages and general prosperity if the Luddites of the early part of the century had won their battles? Port operators and shipping companies used less productive dockers because they worked with less capital and equipment. Are you willing to pay more or less money to the company? How and for how long will that shareholder be forced to pay more? The harm done to the shareholder’s family and the suffering it causes to “American workers, in this case longshore workers.” , hurt, harm”? How is such a utility comparison scientifically possible? What is the elasticity of substitution of demand (foreign and domestic) for ports on the U.S. East Coast and Gulf Coast for ports on the U.S. West Coast? What is the elasticity of sea freight substitution for air freight by exporters and importers of the United States? Relative cost and price tops at U.S. East Coast ports To what extent will the increase affect shipping from east to west, or the substitution of air transport for shipping? How do rewards relate to productivity? Stopping automation at East Coast and Gulf ports? What is the impact on the relative compensation of great American workers at East Coast and Gulf Coast ports compared to no less great American workers at West Coast ports? Should containers and barcodes, which the ILA unsuccessfully opposed decades ago, be discontinued? What are the possible consequences? What are the consequences of banning containers and barcodes (or even computers) on the currently incredible wages of American workers? How does a political system in which policies are decided according to the importance of an issue (to me) serve anyone and how? The World Bank’s Container Port Performance Index (2023) ranks the most efficient U.S. container port 53rd out of 405 ports, behind several Latin American ports and many Asian ports. Why is there? How can a machine that “needs constant replacement” be profitable? Does it depend on long-term productivity and cost discount differentials? Or, in the words of George Will, So, will America “become great again using only everlasting machines”? Are the workers themselves eternal and never able to strike? How would controlling the costs and prices of American ports, either directly or indirectly (through union privileges), affect the efficient use of knowledge in society? American Economics, 1945 – How useful is F. A. Hayek’s analysis of this general problem in the review article “The Use of Knowledge in Society”?
Google Scholar shows 25,800 results excluding citations for the keyword “Economic Automation American Seaports,” of which 15,600 refer to studies published in the past two years. Titles range from “Automating Logistics Ports and Freight Transport with Blockchain Technology” (Transportation Research Procedia) to “Investing in Infrastructure and Trade: The Case of Ports” (National Bureau of Economic Research). If a modern-day Pico wanted to know just a fraction of, or almost everything there is to know, there would be a lot of work to do.
*******************************************
The featured image in this post is just a surreal shadow of what I instructed DALL-E to do. But interestingly, perhaps by chance, the AI bot chose the name for the ship.
Unloading ships without automation with DALL-E
