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Survey: Most Americans Support Limiting Trucker’s Driving Times

A recent survey conducted for the insurance industry shows that most Americans support shorter drive times for truckers and are willing to pay for it. According to a survey conducted by the Insurance Research Council, a majority of the public, 57 percent, believes that increasing from 10 to 12 the number of hours a truck driver is allowed to drive with no break is unsafe

by Staff
January 11, 2001
2 min to read


A recent survey conducted for the insurance industry shows that most Americans support shorter drive times for truckers and are willing to pay for it.
According to a survey conducted by the Insurance Research Council, a majority of the public, 57 percent, believes that increasing from 10 to 12 the number of hours a truck driver is allowed to drive with no break is unsafe.

More than half, about 56 percent, said they would be willing to pay more for goods and shipping to have truckers' total working hours reduced to no more than 12 hours per day. Eighteen percent of Americans were willing to pay 1 percent more, another 18 percent would pay 3 percent more, 12 percent would pay 5 percent more, and 8 percent were willing to pay 10 percent or more for goods and shipping to limit truckers to working no more than 12 hours per day.
Six in ten Americans reported seeing a large truck being operated in an unsafe manner "frequently," "fairly often," or "sometimes." About 81 percent of those surveyed said they oppose allowing bigger rigs on the road.
Elizabeth A. Sprinkel, senior vice president of the IRC, says that highway safety is a big concern to the American public.
“People not only support regulations that promote truck-driving safety, but they are also willing to pay for them,” she says.

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