Free Republic

Supply chains are not something most of us think about on a day-to-day basis. Or they weren't, until the last few years, when we've been exposed, at least on the right, to the fragility and susceptibility of said supply chains. This author works in the shipping industry and has a few thoughts. First and foremost, one needs a rudimentary understanding of how the supply chain actually works, so here is a summation. Let's call it Supply Chain 101: 1. A producer creates goods. 2. Goods need to get to market, which is handled by shippers. 3. Markets may be local,...

An 85-year-old Indiana-based trucking and logistics company and its affiliates recently filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection less than nine months after it was acquired by private-equity firm Transport Acquisitions. Founded in 1938, Otwell, Indiana-based Elmer Buchta Trucking, which offers bulk, dry van and pneumatic trucking services, has 100 drivers and more than 230 power units, according to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s SAFER website. No reason was given as to why the entities were forced to file for bankruptcy protection. Transport Acquisitions purchased the trucking company and its affiliates in January from the Wright Family Investment Group, which...

Orbcomm, a major provider of ELDs to the trucking sector, is dealing with a ransomware attack that has limited the ability of its customers to use its Fleet Manager offering, which includes its Blue Tree ELD systems, the company has confirmed. Resolving the issue may take up to two weeks. (snip) In a notice to Orbcomm customers Wednesday, supplied to FreightWaves by an Orbcomm customer, the company said under the heading “Rebuild and Restore” that it is “targeting to restore full use of our BT product line and the supporting platforms as well as RCOM Reports by September 28.” The...

American truckers have issued a warning about the Biden administration's plans to reduce air pollution by cracking down on heavy-duty vehicle emissions, saying that President Biden's proposed policies will crush the supply chain and put the American food supply at risk. Under the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which aims to reduce emissions of nitrogen oxides and other pollutants by enacting stringent new regulations on heavy-duty vehicles and machinery, businesses will be subjected to unattainable standards which will result in high inflation and put trucking companies out of business, American trucking officials warn. Mike Kucharski, vice president and co-owner of JKC...

U.S. trucking firm Yellow Corp (YELL.O) filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Sunday and said it would wind down, after struggling with a mounting debt load and following tense contract negotiations with the Teamsters Union. The nearly 100-year-old company's bankruptcy filing in a Delaware court estimated assets and liabilities of $1 billion to $10 billion, with more than 100,000 creditors. The collapse of Yellow, formerly called YRC Worldwide, puts about 30,000 workers at risk when the freight industry is already grappling with a slump in volumes.

The economic meltdown that is coming should not be a surprise to anyone. Throughout U.S. history, there have always been signs that a major downturn was coming, and that is precisely what we are witnessing right now. Tax revenues are way down, demand for trucking services is way down, demand for cardboard boxes is way down, the money supply is shrinking at the fastest pace in modern history, and the Conference Board’s index of leading economic indicators has already declined for 15 months in a row. At this point, anyone that cannot see what is coming has got to be...

Bidenomics at work! From the alleged more Pro-Union member of the US Senate and now El Presidente of the United Banana Republics of America. One of the biggest bankruptcies in US trucking history occurred Sunday when the nation’s third-largest less-than-truckload carrier, Yellow Corp., filed Chapter 11 in a Deleware court. The company has fallen victim to insurmountable debts, including a government loan and tense contract negotiations with the Teamsters Union. It listed assets and liabilities at $1 billion-$10 billion, with more than 100,000 creditors. “It is with profound disappointment that Yellow announces that it is closing after nearly 100 years...

Yellow Freight, a massive, almost century-old LTL carrier, has gone out of business, and the “spin” of the business world will likely rival the spin of the political world in covering this news. First, some background. LTL refers to “less than truckload freight,” so an LTL carrier is one that picks up relatively small loads, usually 1 to 5 pallets’ worth, and consolidates them at terminals with other such freight with similar destinations, in what is called a “cross-dock” operation. Through a network of base terminals across a metro area, a region, or even the entire country, the nation’s thousands...

Yellow Corp., a 99-year-old trucking company that was once a dominant player in its field, halted operations Sunday and will lay off all 30,000 of its workers. The unionized company has been in a battle with the Teamsters union, which represents about 22,000 drivers and dock workers at the company. Just a week ago the union canceled a threatened strike that had been prompted by the company failing to contribute to its pension and health insurance plans. The union granted the company an extra month to make the required payments. But by midweek last week, the company had stopped picking...

Biden: “Its my Presidency and I’ll lie if I want to.” As well as demolish the economy to serve his Progressive green energy agenda. One of the casualties? Yellow trucking. Carrier Yellow Corp. ceased all operations at 12 p.m. Sunday, according to a notice on the gates at its terminals. Its stock price is now sub $1. Separate internal documents showed the procedures for closing the facilities as well as “talking points” to be used when informing union employees not to show up for their shifts. The documents indicated the company plans to issue a public statement Monday updating “the...

Trucking giant Yellow collapsed on Sunday, ceasing operations immediately and leaving some 30,000 workers without jobs. The closure is the biggest in terms of jobs and revenue in the U.S. trucking industry, according to The Wall Street Journal - which first reported its shutdown. The company, which received $700 million in federal COVID relief funds in 2020, is preparing to file for bankruptcy and is in talks to sell off all or parts of the business. The nearly 100-year-old firm is known for its competitive pricing and has more than 12,000 trucks shipping freight across the US for brands including...

US trucking firm Yellow has laid off a large number of workers as the company copes with a cash crunch, and is reportedly weighing options including an imminent bankruptcy filing. The trucking giant on Friday told employees that it is 'shutting down regular operations' and laying off non-union employees 'at all of its locations' according to a memo seen by DailyMail.com. The layoffs could immediately impact up to 8,000 members of the company's sales force, business operations and technology departments -- and if the company fails, another 22,000 unionized drivers and freight handlers could face unemployment. Yellow is saddled with...

Yellow’s senior vice president of sales informed her staff on Wednesday that their last day would be Friday and the less-than-truckload carrier will file bankruptcy on Monday, according to three employees who attended the video call. Yellow (NASDAQ: YELL) is the third-largest LTL company and employs some 30,000 workers, including around 22,000 Teamsters members. The trucking company had an operating revenue of $5.245 billion in 2022. The sales employees were approved to tell customers of the bankruptcy plans and to take paid time off for the rest of the week. In a meeting later Wednesday, according to a video of...

Without truckers, America would grind to a halt. There’s no doubt about it. Truckers work a demanding job delivering our food, clothes and other necessities. But rather than support our hard-working men and women behind the wheel, President Joe Biden continues to empty their wallets and force them to drive electric trucks for his radical climate-change agenda. Well, we are pushing back. The Biden administration’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and California have no right or legal justification to force truckers to follow their radical climate-change policies. That’s why I, along with 18 other state attorneys general, are taking Biden to...

It’s a well-established fact that the Biden administration thinks that electric vehicles are the solution to everything. (Ring around the collar? Buy an EV. Troubles in the bedroom? Buy an EV. Thinning hair? You get the picture.) So it shouldn’t surprise any of us that the administration has decided that what the trucking industry needs most is a great big transition to electric trucks. Last month, we reported about how the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is looking to follow California’s lead in declaring war on diesel vehicles. At the time, many in the trucking industry expressed their dismay at the...

Is Biden targeting white republicans' small businesses the same way Stalin targeted the Kulaks during the holodomor? Biden is not only targeting small business truckers, he is also targeting family farms By Ezequiel Doiny On April 17, 2023 Madeline Coggins wrote in Fox Business "The trucking industry is sounding the alarm on consequential ripple effects of the Biden administration's latest move in the electric vehicle push. While critics have voiced concerns about the EPA's recent emissions regulations, the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA), a trade organization that represents small business truckers, warns the restrictions are dangerous and threaten small businesses...

Powered by small business owners and union workers alike, the trucking industry is on a collision course with the Democrat Party over federal and local efforts to phase out diesel rigs and push the shipping industry to electric vehicles. The latest strike came a few weeks ago when the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed new tailpipe emissions goals that could require up to two-thirds of new vehciles sold in the U.S. by 2032 to be battery-powered electric vehicles. A top executive of one of the country’s largest trucking companies declared Tuesday that EPA's proposed new regulations on carbon emission are...

As more drilling and mining projects are approved in Alaska, local trucking fleets are planning to hire drivers around the United States to haul equipment, chemicals and other loads — particularly on its fearsome Dalton Highway, a remote, 414-mile road that connects Fairbanks to oil fields near the Arctic Ocean. The developments, particularly ConocoPhillips Alaska’s Willow project, have been controversial as they may mar some of Earth’s most remote land. However, for the residents of the United States’ third-least-populated state, the new investments could bring an economic boom that many locals say the state needs. The construction of the Trans-Alaska...

California regulators on Friday voted to ban the sale of new diesel big rigs by 2036 and require all trucks to be zero-emissions by 2042, a decision that puts the state at the forefront of mitigating national tailpipe pollution. The California Air Resources Board unanimously approved the Advanced Clean Fleets rule, the state's second zero-emissions trucks rule and first in the world to require new commercial trucks, including garbage trucks, delivery trucks and other medium and heavy-duty vehicles, to be electric. Supporters of the rule say it will improve public health in marginalized communities that have endured polluted air while...

California is rich in natural resources which once powered the state: natural gas deposits in the Monterey Shale formation; geothermal energy, abundant rivers and waterways such as the San Joaquin River Delta and hydroelectric dams; the Pacific coastline; 85 million acres of wildlands with 17 million of those used as commercial timberland; mines and mineral resources, vast farming and agricultural lands, and hunting and fishing. Despite this abundance, in June 2020 the California Air Resources Board (CARB) approved regulations to require automakers to sell more electric commercial trucks, with the ultimate goal of all new trucks sold in rather state...