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Labor Studies Journal 27.4 (2003) 120-122



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Sweatshops on Wheels: Winners and Losers in Trucking Deregulation. By Michael H. Belzer. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. 256 pp. $35 hardback.

For the past 25 years there has been a steady movement toward deregulation in many industries. In Sweatshops on Wheels, Michael Belzer investigates the results of deregulation in the trucking industry. Belzer describes the creation of a regulated trucking industry, gives an analysis of the changes since deregulation, and offers a prescription for changes that might help the industry in the future.

The Motor Carrier Act (1935) placed the regulatory responsibility for the trucking industry within the Interstate Commerce Commission [End Page 120] (ICC). The ICC rationalized the trucking industry and ended the excessive competition that had characterized it. The International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT) successfully organized the industry, eventually centralizing collective bargaining in the 1964 National Master Freight Agreement. The combination of ICC regulation and Teamster strength created desirable jobs in the trucking industry that were comparable to other union jobs. In 1977 the ICC consciously began to loosen the regulations that had stabilized the industry for the previous forty years. The Motor Carrier Act (1980) codified ICC changes and reduced the restrictions that limited competition in the industry.

Belzer carefully analyzes the effects of deregulation. He employs a number of statistical models and cobbles together quantitative data from different sources, including the Bureau of Labor Statistics, University of Michigan Trucking Industry Program, American Trucking Association, and ICC. Many of Belzer's conclusions are predictable. He finds that deregulation, coupled with a related deunionization, has benefited shippers and consumers because shipping rates have been substantially reduced. Drivers, on the other hand, have been the hardest hit. They work longer (often illegal) hours, make substantially less money, and are not paid for the non-driving work their job requires.

Deregulation has reshaped and segmented the industry into less-than-truckload (LTL) and truckload (TL) sectors. This segmentation is important for drivers because the Teamsters has maintained a strong presence only in the LTL sector (e.g. United Parcel Service), which has experienced a smaller decline in wages than the now predominantly non-union TL sector. Perhaps the most important among Belzer's several arguments is his conclusion that the reduced rates provided to shippers and consumers did not come primarily from increases in efficiency and productivity, as deregulation supporters argued, but rather, they came largely from the "sweating" of trucking labor and the corresponding decrease in wages paid to truckers.

Although Belzer acknowledges the flaws and benefits of his statistical sources, the use of statistical samples coming in such a wide variety of forms (e.g., self-reporting surveys, as well as legally mandated reportage) to compare and contrast changes over time is tricky and may leave Belzer open to critique. But this should not detract from what is generally an excellent look at how 25 years of deregulation transformed the trucking industry.

Belzer skillfully combines historical background with statistical analysis and clearly demonstrates the importance of public policy in labor [End Page 121] relations. Sweatshops On Wheels should be a useful source in labor studies courses that cover public policy and the unions' role in politics generally.

 



Joseph M. Turrini
The Catholic University of America

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