Congress has a golden opportunity to solve the delays in the international supply chain, but so far, they are missing the mark. The legislation passed by the House of Representatives takes the wrong approach to shipping reform. The good news is the Senate can fix the mistakes in the House passed bill, but the bad news is some Members of Congress continue to agitate to repeal ocean carrier antitrust immunity, which combined with a problematic House bill, will only worsen the current difficulties with the supply chain.
As the pandemic spread and prices spiked in response to unprecedented consumer demand, some conveniently pointed fingers at ocean carriers claiming monopolistic behavior. These allegations were dispelled by the European Union (EU) which investigated the issue last year and found, in November of 2021, that with regard to price increases for container shipping, the EU has “not received evidence or identified anti-competitive behaviour in relation to these price increases.” The argument that the ocean carrier companies collude or otherwise act in an anti-competitive manner is simply not true.
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