A new bill making its way through the Senate is looking to make trucking safer, but has taken an unusual strategy to do. The Truck Safety Act is a many-pronged approach to safety, but perhaps the most interesting aspect of it is that it would mandate that truck drivers must get paid for all hours worked regardless of whether or not they’re driving.

While the bill wouldn’t replace per mile pay for truckers, it would require carriers to pay their drivers an hourly wage for time spent working, but not driving.





“Unfortunately, standard industry practice is for truck drivers to be paid based on miles driven and not hours worked, causing truckers to be overworked, which creates perilous safety conditions on the nation’s roads,” said Cory Booker, the Senator who proposed the bill.

Hourly driver pay isn’t the only safety measure proposed in the bill however. Sen. Booker’s bill also proposes an increase in minimum insurance levels from $750,000 to $1.5 million, mandatory collision avoidance systems, mandatory speed limiters, and would even mandate a study to examine how drivers commuting to work before starting their shift can affect their driving.

The last seems to be a clear response to the high-profile crash which injured actor/comedian Tracy Morgan and killed fellow comedian James McNair. The accident involved a Walmart truck driver who, despite being within his allowable hours, allegedly had not slept in 24 hours at the time of the crash due to his long commute from home to start working.

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Source: gobytrucknews, truckinginfo, overdrive

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