LOS ANGELES — Negotiators reached a tentative contract covering West Coast dockworkers on Friday evening, likely ending a protracted labor dispute that snarled international trade at seaports handling about $1 trillion worth of cargo annually.
The breakthrough came after nine months of talks that turned contentious in the fall, when dockworkers and their employers began blaming each other for problems getting imports to consumers and exports overseas.
The five-year deal still must be approved by the 13,000-member International Longshore and Warehouse Union’s rank-and-file. They work 29 ports from San Diego to Seattle that handle about one-quarter of all U.S. international trade, much of it with Asia.
U.S. Secretary of Labor Thomas Perez, who this week began overseeing talks, said that both the dockworkers’ union and their employers agreed to resume work Saturday evening. As the two sides quarreled, employers cut most weekend work, saying they would not pay extra wages.
With ships and their cargo weeks behind schedule, “I suspect that people will be getting a lot of overtime in the days ahead,” Perez said.