I wish MMP and AMO had presidents like President Harold Daggett

Professional Mariner Forum
1

I remember as a young third mate on my first ship just looking at the guys lashing down the containers and I was thinking to myself these guys are making more money than me and they’re just tightening a turn buckle or loosening one. And they didn’t even graduate high school. How does a longshoreman that puts luggage on a cruise ship make the same amount of money or more as a second mate on a domestic tanker. Are unions are a joke, we should be the ones striking!!!

In image having the as MMP President Harold Daggett.

4 Likes
2

No, thanks.

1 Like
3

These 8th grade dropouts with minimal skills and no licenses (that go home everyday) are making $200,000 a year and have rejected a 50% pay increase?

And they are continuing to fight off the port automation that everyone else is using.

They prevent US coastal short sea shipping with excessive stevedoring costs. It’s much cheaper to ship by truck.

They significantly inflate the cost of 90% of everything.

It’s long past time for the Government to step in and break up the two longshoremen’s unions into many one port unions, and mandate automation.

Meanwhile, if MMP and MEBA were any good, they would be calling strikes for wage parity with the longshoremen.

12 Likes
4

You hit a home run.

2 Likes
5

So your complaint is the longshoremen unions is doing a better job for their members than MMP and MEBA? That’s a problem better addressed to MEBA and MMP leadership. Longshoreman unions are significantly increasing the price on 90% of everything? Gimme a break it is pennies on the dollar considering the cargo handled. Sounds like sour grapes to me.Become a longshoreman if it’s that great.
I have had problems with their union and they pissed me off from time to time but they sure take care of their members and for damn sure their workers are better off than their non-union counter parts

4 Likes
7

“Workers”. Scammers and scum, more like.

1 Like
9

Genovese family associate? I don’t want a union president with mob ties. Bad for press at the very least.

1 Like
10

I was at a meeting with higher level guys from all the unions.

One said the need masters and asked “John, why do go back to sea”

My response:
“When are you going to strike to make it worth my time?”

They all laughed but I was being serious.

Most pro union president in my lifetime and they won’t even use their leverage to press the uscg into issuing medical certificates in a reasonable amount of time :man_facepalming:

The again why should they? Daggett didn’t strike because he wanted more money (the guy is loaded) he did it because they are loosing jobs to automation and the members demanded it.

If you guys don’t demand (demand, nit just send an email asking for them to yell at the uscg for delays) action from your union representatives I don’t see anything changing

6 Likes
11

Every US deep sea Mariner could be replaced byIndians and Filipinos. We don’t have the same leverage as the guys working every single port on a coast.

1 Like
12

Not while the Jones act still exists.

4 Likes
13

The union reps do not respond. “Strike” isn’t anywhere on their radar. I’ve brought it up to both MMP and MEBA and they ignore it. It’s been my experience, neither union is at all interested in getting members substantial pay raises for its members.
Why unionize if the unions will not strike? Merchant mariner pay is not keeping up with unions on land.

4 Likes
14

Exactly

I also hear “I’ve asked” and “I’ve sent repeated emails” and “i raised my hand at a union meeting”

What I don’t hear are any demands. Anyone organizing groups within each union.

What I don’t hear are demands. I don’t hear anger for decades of stagnating salaries.

These union reps have a good life. They don’t get paid extraordinary amounts but they have expenses accounts snd travel budgets and an easy workload.

Almost every week we get press releases for a gala awards dinner at some fancy hotel honoring some ceo who previously ran 4 us shipping company into bankruptcy and a union rep who cut some benefit. Hell tote got a huge humanitarian award THE YEAR AFTER THE EL FARO

They are all “to support charities” but in reality they are nothing but booze fests to stroke egos

You know who never gets any awards? Anyone who makes waves or questions the system

You know who I’ve never seen on an gala dinner awards list? Daggett!

Get mad… be “unreasonable… organize…. then you’ll get paid! That’s the lesson Daggett is teaching us!

And don’t tell me you don’t know how. I get angry calls and forum posts calling me an Ahole all the time.
Direct all that anger at them.

7 Likes
15

This is the kind of BS I’m talking about :point_down::point_down:

IMG_0104
IMG_01041206×2622 512 KB

“Prestigious” who says these awards are “prestigious”??

They are ego pay offs.

The only reason you think they are prestigious is because the union newsletter keeps telling you they are prestigious

The US Maritime Industry is in the toilet running ancient ships into the ground. That’s the very opposite of “prestigious”

Martin Luther overturned centuries of precedence to get rid of ego honorifics and member “political action fund” (or whatever the catholic church called them) mandatory fees… but you guys won’t even tell Adam where he can shove his award. Instead people flood this forum telling me I’m a jerk

I am. And I received a “prestigious” award once “schuyer alumni of the year”. It made me feel sick to my stomach.

IMG_0105
IMG_01051206×1653 516 KB

:nauseated_face:

Why does it make me sick? Because I run the biggest maritime publication and forum in the nation and I’ve accomplished nothing to prevent the decline of the us maritime industry.

Not through lack of trying - I gave up 10 years of captain salaries to run this site - but “trying” isn’t worthy of a prestigious award. Accomplishments are worthy. Actual home runs that get you paid are worthy. Not holding a CEO or union president seat during the fall of Rome. That deserves ridicule and scorn.

I’ve received offers for many more awards since (they like that I can fill $2,000 a plate seats) then but have declined every single one. Why? Because I prefer sleeping soundly at night.

You know what I tell them now? Call me when the Bill I wrote with rep mike waltz and senator mark kelly gets passed and YOU get more ships and benefits. Then I’ll take an award.

But they won’t call me then because they are already lining up to take credit when in fact they have done little but make the bill writing process harder

I take that back. The new AMO President, Captain Willie Barrere, showed up at the bill writing workshop waltz and the Secretary of the Navy organized and Willie was a big help. And SIU sent their high dollar lawyers who kinda helped too.

Where was Adam Vocak? Where wasl Don Marcus? Probably busy writing their speeches for the next awards dinner to support foreign seafarers

Yet there are 100 posts calling me a jerk for every one calling out a union president. And you wonder why Joe Hazlewood made $189,000 THIRTY FIVE YEARS ago but AMO has a fee captains making less than that right now?

So fine… trash me. Tell me I’m being “too hard on Mayor Pete” post all about how I’m a libtard commie when I supported black mariners after George Floyd or women after Midshipman X. Go ahead and tell me I’m a hard right Trump supporting nazi when I post that I’ve been advising Project 2025 to get our interests in the white house.

I don’t care. Because the OP was :100: right… I wish we had an unreasonable ahole like Daggett in one of our union. Aholes get sh!p done.

Acts non verb brothers - actions not words

F “prestigious” awards. Tell vocak and marcus you want action! Or vote them out snd put an ahole like Daggett in. THIS IS THE US MERCHANT MARINE we have NO SHORTAGE of aholes who get shit done. I know because I’ve sailed with too many to count.

7 Likes
16

And while you’re at it tell your union presidents to stop endorsing Navy Admirals for MARAD!

Mark Buzby is one of my favorite people in the world - he :100: had our interests at heart - but you don’t get stars on your shoulder in today’s navy by rocking the boat. You get it by toting the corporate line snd by the way the Navy treats MSC civmars it doesn’t take a genius to figure out what line the navy takes

It would be inconceivable for the FAA to not consider a pilot or NASA and astronaut for the top position. But when was the last time we had a ship Captain as head of MARAD?

Why? Well I can’t publish the full truth without the k-street cabal coming for my head but I guarantee you marad is the root of your problems

8 Likes
17

John, some of your best writing is when you’re pissed off about something.

11 Likes
18

I am pissed! So is Daggett! So is Representative Waltz. So is Senator Mark Kelly. So is every merchant mariner I’ve talked to who has been under Houthi or Hamas attack. So is the captain of the USS Abraham Lincoln who cannot get avgas because our only msc oiler in the region grounded. So is the SECNAV who has to lay up 17 msc ships because we don’t have enough mariners.

So is everyone when the CEO of OSG slips up an tells Tradewinds the truth we all know they say in the back rooms during these award rallies: they want to keep the jones act but bring in Philippines seafarers to replace us

But then the union writes a letter and the anger subsides.

Then OSG’s K-Street lawyer sends everyone the latest CATO anti-jones act bullshit to “remind us who the enemy” is and redirect our attention away from the idiots at marad. YES cato IS the enemy… but they aren’t the only one. Trust me our top Jones Act lobbyists is VERY GOOD I’ve met him. He got this and $1.3M per of your dues going to his yearly salary (and tens of millions more to other JA groups) is money well spent. The JA is safe.

Problem is CATO is NOT our only enemy. The JA can’t be our only focus. It must be supported but should not be smoke screen to hide all the other bullshit

Listen to them when they tell you they want to keep their Jones Act protection as shipowners but replace YOU. Thankful even don marcus won’t let that happen - unions do serve an important purpose - but that’s just defending the status quo… and the status quo sucks

P.S. there was one union rep who was consistently on this forum (sometime vis sn anonymous account) dropping truth bombs and fighting the union presidents for YOU. He’d call me often to get me info to publish snd rile me up.

His name was Mike Finnegan and sadly the stress of fighting this battle alone took his life

IMG_0106
IMG_01061206×1506 298 KB

So yes I’m angry! Mike was a good friends. The OP is :100: right, we need more people like Daggett and Finnegan in charge of our unions. Not guys who own tuxedos to attend all the F’n “prestigious” award ceremonies that stroke their ego and end up screwing us out of more pay.

4 Likes
19

I haven’t sailed on a JA vessel since 2017. I work with people who think the Korean built box boats are JA because we stop at consecutive US ports.

2 Likes
20

Good for you, maybe you can explain to them why those are American flagged but not Jones Act compliant.

Thankfully we have the Jones Act to keep the majority of our US Mariners employed and keep some semblance of national security when it comes commercial shipping and sealift.

21

You mean “we need more people like the alleged Genovese Family associate who lives in a 7,000-square-foot house, drives a Bentley, and makes north of $900,000/yr.*”

FIFY.

*Teamsters president (1.3 million members), UAW president (400,000 members), AFL-CIO president (12.5 million members), all make less than $300,000/yr, reportedly. ILA has 45,000 members, by comparison.

1 Like
22

MMP’s Sec. Treasurer and President make $230,000 and $250,000 per year, respectively — the exact amount they’re overpaid, IMO.

4 Likes