America’s broken supply chain
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 19 October 2021
⏱️ ? minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The commercial pipeline is clogged. Every year, this supply chain brings $1 trillion worth of toys, clothing, electronics and furniture from Asia to the United States. And right now, no one knows how to unclog it.
Read more:
For months, consumers have confronted shortages of goods such as clothing, toys, groceries and cars. And those shortages aren’t going away any time soon.
Reporter David J. Lynch visited the ports of Southern California— where giant container ships are waiting up to two weeks to unload their berth – and several of the country’s crammed rail yards and warehouses to figure out what’s clogging the global supply chain.
Correction: A previous version of this episode description incorrectly stated where the reporter visited. He visited ports in Southern California, not shipyards.
If you value the journalism you hear in this podcast, please subscribe to The Washington Post. We have a deal for our listeners – one year of unlimited access to everything The Post publishes for just $29. To sign up, go to washingtonpost.com/subscribe.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Have you personally had to wait a long time for a package to arrive these days? |
| 0:07.8 | Arteen, I'm glad you asked me that question because yes, in fact I have. |
| 0:14.9 | I had a very old minivan that flunked Virginia's annual safety inspection and needed a new |
| 0:23.2 | seat belt buckle on the driver's side. |
| 0:26.1 | My mechanic tells me that's normally a two-day process of ordering and delivering. |
| 0:31.3 | In our case it took over three weeks and when he first went to Honda to get the part, Honda |
| 0:38.0 | told him they literally had no idea at all when the part would show up. |
| 0:43.7 | That is David Lynch. |
| 0:44.7 | And I'm the Global Economics Correspondent here at the Washington Post. |
| 0:49.5 | David's been reporting on this mystery of why it's been hard to get a lot of things right |
| 0:54.2 | now from car parts to lumber to shoes to exercise gear. |
| 0:59.6 | And David says that's all because the global supply chain has gotten blocked in a bunch |
| 1:04.0 | of critical places. |
| 1:05.7 | Normally this process works in a very fluid way. |
| 1:10.8 | It's really a daily miracle in some ways. |
| 1:14.0 | We've all gotten accustomed to going on Amazon or Walmart hitting a couple of keystrokes |
| 1:18.8 | and then Presto something shows up at the door in 24 or 48 hours. |
| 1:24.2 | But under the stress and changed consumption patterns of the pandemic, this daily miracle |
| 1:31.8 | has broken down. |
| 1:33.7 | And today we're going to figure out why. |
| 1:36.8 | From the newsroom of the Washington Post, this is Post Reports. |
| 1:40.1 | I'm Martin Powers. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Washington Post, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Washington Post and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.