Stacks of empty shipping containers drive up costs Lindsay Chappell Courtesy Port of Oakland Battleships can't turn on a dime, and neither, apparently, can the global traffic of container ships. And that's bad news for the auto industry. According to the consulting firm AlixPartners, a perfect storm of market problems last year got the world's supply of shipping containers out of whack, and as a result, overseas shipping prices have been rising. The spot price for shipping a 40-foot container from Shanghai to Long Beach, Calif., has reached a 10-year high, exceeding $4,000, AlixPartners reported last week — up from a normal rate of $1,600.