The Shipping Collapse: Long Beach Container Traffic Down 15.8%
Posted by kandylini on October 19, 2008
From the Urban Survival site‘s daily updated news page. Better stock up on the essentials.
We noted yesterday how “China Shipping Traffic may plunge as exports slow” but few people have likely figured out the personal implications of this; the largest being the worst bummer of a Christmas ever as goods coming to the U.S. are starting to dry up. A reader who’s familiar with the docks in the Pacific Northwest reports anecdotally that most of the ships coming in from Asia in the past few weeks have been ‘above their waterlines’ – a far cry from what the boom in consumer goods has been like over the past few years.
No, this is not something I’m making up – it’s NOT being widely reported in the MainStreamMedia, however, because about the worst thing that could happen to the economy would be for consumers to really (and I mean really) tighten down on spending.
For example, the Port of Portland is out with September results and air freight is down 13.1 percent from year ago levels according to the Portland Business Journal.
No, I couldn’t find a press release on the Port of Long Beach web site, which I guess explains why there’s no MSM focus on it yet, but if you know where to go sniffing for the latest statistics, you’ll see that loaded inbound Port of Long Beach container unit traffic is down 15.8% compared with year ago levels.
It doesn’t take a rocket surgeon to figure out that if container traffic is down 15.8% that sales of foreign-made goods should decline by a proportionate amount and profits (remember those good days?) would likely drop farther and faster.
Given the economy, an even bigger year-on-year decline seems likely by the time October figures come out.
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Given the difficulties with letters of credit lately, odds seem good that you should be worried about the ‘ultimate tipping point’ in the U.S. economy. Here’s how it works:
Usually, in a ‘normal recession’ when you get an economic slowdown, prices come down, interest rates on new cars drop to zero (and maybe even a little cash back) and people begin to increase their spending.
The “tip” occurs when things get so bad that despite all the incentives out there in terms of zero percent loans and such, people just cut off all spending and try to save cash. Once that happens, you’ve got a Global Depression.
I’m going to keep today’s report short – I normally don’t do a Saturday post, but the magnitude of this story is such that it should be on every MSM outlet in the country and, in case you haven’t noticed, it’s not.
No talking heads discussing the ‘tipping point’, no government policy to address it (other than give money to bankers and pray a lot). So I’ll just tell you that within the next week or two, as the market slide picks up speed to the downside, that maybe you’ll see the stories forthcoming then about how global trade is collapsing.
Remember where you heard it first. It’s the only story worth reporting from an economic standpoint and I don’t see anyone else putting the larger context on it.
