OCR Text |
Show -7- ability of the applicant to provide service. 3. Rate bureaus have been established to serve the public not the trucking companies. The carrier must always allow the shipper the cheapest published rate on any given commodity. If a rate change (either increase or decrease) is requested the carrier must prove the need. 4. ICC records, available for public inspection, show the 40% empty back-haul figure to be totally erroneous. The figure is actually 7%. Certain kinds of trucks are one way by their nature-milk trucks, petroleum haulers, auto haulers, etc. An exact balance of traffic for any given area is impossible. Washington, D.C.,for example, is a receiving area and not a shipping area. Trucks bringing goods from New York City to the nation's capitol would probably return to New York empty. Deregulating the industry or abolishing the ICC would not change the amount of back-haul tonnage from Washington, D.C. The National Industrial Traffic League (NITL) representing most of the large shippers in the USA has gone on record as opposing deregulation. President August Heist stated "deregulators ignore that carriers exist for the purpose of serving the public in the movement of goods and passengers, and that public regulation of transportation must be administered by permanent, independent, and non-political bodies." The American Trucking Association has brought forth the stoutest defense of the ICC and the transportation system as it stands, accusing the"deregulators" of trying to dismantle the one function in our economy that is working. |