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By Mitchell Lowe, Guest Writer Most Americans have heard of political action committees, or PACs, but couldn’t tell you the first thing about them—except that they’re evil. Their malicious image is largely the result of negative press and the wide- spread demonization of special interest groups in the political process. The fact is PACs, in […]

By Tom Ricciardone, Guest Writer On February 5, the day after an icy, wintry mix hit Central Arkansas, the front page of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette featured a four-column wide photo of an over-turned tractor-trailer. The bold type headline: “Rig Flips on I-30 Exit Ramp.” Just days later, after another blast of weather, Sunday’s Page 1

From The President’s Desk   The ‘power of association’ is a phrase we often use. The phrase is perfect in the way it describes how the Arkansas Trucking Association (ATA) has consistently performed well for its’ member companies. Simply put, the power of association is about leveraging the collective strengths of individual companies. Conversely, the

From The President’s Desk Business owners—trucking and otherwise—have a hard time seeing the forest for the trees. In the big picture, things are going great. Business is booming; there was a surge of Class 8 truck orders this fall. But company owners don’t like to brag about how we’ll they’re doing. And in trucking, we tend

By Mitchell Lowe, Guest Writer While it’s difficult to identify any political winners in the aftermath of last month’s partial federal government shutdown, it’s not difficult to deduce that U.S. Senator Mark Pryor likely benefits the most from the fact that it occurred more than a year prior to Election Day 2014. Several recently released

From The President’s Desk Much has been written about the new hours-of-service rules. Not many people in the industry are happy and even fewer know what to do about this seemingly endless cycle of change in the number of hours a commercial truck driver may work. Let’s take the issue down to its basics. Because that’s

By Steve Banker Guest Writer In the latest State of Logistics Report, it is reported that the trucking industry is currently short by about 30,000 drivers. Logistics professionals are frequently warned by trucking trade associations and big carriers about how CSA regulations have reduced the driver pool, and how Hours of Service will reduce driver productivity by

From the President’s Desk Three years ago a young man walked into a trucking company and applied for a job as a truck driver. The application process went well. So the company offered him a job—subject to passing a urinalysis—the federally mandated drug and alcohol exam that helps make sure we keep drug abusers from