When former President Trump was in office, he often talked about manufacturing in America, but the reality is most of what America buys is made offshore. In recent weeks, we have all read or heard about supply lines conjestion.

In an article by Nathan Vanderklippe in the Globe outlines the issue.

40% of all goods coming by sea come through the Los Angeles area. The ports of LA and Long Beach are working 24/7 to clear a mountain of floating goods estimated to be worth $26 billion.

According to Kevin Mullaney, chief executive of Grayson Co, a retail conultancy, anything that touches land after November 1 will not see the floor for Christmas. (hopefully when you read this the backlog is normal).

Todd Spencer, president of the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association, representing over 150,000 truckers says the reality is the demand for imported goods that arrives via ship is greater than our ability to handle or process those loads.

Imports to the US have reached record levels, it was $287 billion in August, the last month for which there is data.

In LA and Long Beach, containers that in 2019 spent 2 and half days on average are now waiting for more than 5.

Containers are now waiting 9 days on a truck after leaving port. The industry believes the standard should be 1 to 3 days.

If a ship goes to another port such as Savannah, Georgia, Houston, New Jersey and New York – all of them have set new records for container movement.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, politicians say something but it is often different in reality. Companies deal in reality and in reality manufacturing is primarily done offshore, retail is handled on shore or on line. Every company has a logistical chain and when it works, all is good. When it does not, one wonders if enough resources were put into the logistics chain. How does your investment in company handle their logistics?

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.