The longshoremen strike, affecting every major port on the East Coast and Gulf Coast, will potentially cost billions.

A strike by dockworkers at dozens of U.S. ports has paralyzed about half of the country’s ocean shipping and a prolonged dispute could bring the issue close to home for consumers. The strike, which included about 45,

Unions representing auto workers, actors, hotel housekeepers, and aircraft-assembly workers all called strikes as organized labor made itself heard over the past year. The U.S. dockworkers who went on strike early Tuesday are just the latest unionized group to back their demands for better contracts by walking off the job to illustrate their value to both the national economy and their employers’ bottom line.