In a recent Washington Times/FedEx editorial, the paper warned ominously that if a provision in the FAA reauthorization bill which would place FedEx Express drivers under the same labor law, the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), as every other driver in the nation, “The result could be that a dozen workers in just one key city could, by striking, ground FedEx Express to a virtual halt nationwide.”
Hardly. Here’s the reality.
If Congress amends the law, that doesn’t mean FedEx Express workers are going to join a union.
And even if they did join a union, that doesn’t mean there’d ever be a strike.
And even if there was a strike by drivers, that wouldn’t affect air transportation.
But even if it did affect FedEx air transportation, there would still be other air transportation options for the nation’s commerce.
However, even if all air transportation options were shut down nationwide, commerce would still move, as demonstrated this past week when volcanic ash from Iceland brought all air transportation into and around Europe to a virtual halt.
“Logistics services and express parcel operators in Europe have turned to trucks to keep delivery delays to a minimum and limit the impact of the air traffic disruption in northern Europe,” reported David Pearson in the Wall Street Journal this week. “Express mail, documents and packages that normally would be shipped inside Europe by air are being transported by road instead.”
Pearson further reported that “Express shippers usually rely on cargo planes for shipments to destinations more than 300 miles from their logistics hubs, but trucks are now being used, for example, to take packages from Belgium to Italy and Russia.”
In other words, despite Armageddon-like predictions of FedEx’s business world coming to an end if its drivers are treated equally under the law as every other driver in the United States, in an unlikely worst-case scenario of a labor strike by a dozen workers in one city, FedEx absolutely, positively would find a way to stay in business and keep its packages moving.