The Art of the Deal: East Coast Port Edition
President-elect Donald Trump’s recent support for the dockworkers of the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) should be viewed through the lens of dealmaking.
The battle over automation at East and Gulf Coast ports isn’t just a labor dispute—it’s a question of whether the promised benefits of automation justify the very real economic harm it imposes on workers and their communities. Or, to put it differently, it is a dispute over the distribution of benefits of automation.
Coase Comes to America’s Ports
Economist Ronald Coase’s landmark work on social cost provides a framework for understanding this conflict. Coase famously argued that when parties are free to bargain, they can resolve disputes over costs and benefits to arrive at the most efficient outcome. Applied to the docks, the idea is simple: if…
