The North American Free Trade Agreement first put forth 10 years ago the possibility that Mexican truckers would come across the border and work the transportation industry.

There are worries that the trucks wouldn’t be safe. USA Today reports that such claims may be cries of protectionism in disguise. Canadian trucks have been in the States since 1982.

Instead of Mexican trucks being unsafe, I find it easier to believe that our truckers are overregulated. Title 49 of the U.S. Code contains 9 volumes. There are permits for hazardous materials and commercial driving. New hires have to wait weeks before they can be cleared to drive.

It is in their best interest, license or not, to know how to handle the materials they haul, or else they won’t deliver their cargo or be hurt severely. If Mexicans and Canadians don’t follow the qualification and license requirements Americans do, then there is an unfair advantage, but one that we have done to ourselves.

Mexican trucks have the same incentive U.S. trucks do to keep their trucks safe. If they break down, they don’t deliver their goods, and they don’t get paid.

Every field camp I travel to deals with U.S. trucking laws. With paper logs, drivers in the past would do what they do and then write their compliant logs. It is only with the coming of electronic logs that people are really seeing the force effects of DOT regulation. There is even equipment to blare a loud alarm when the GPS thinks you are going over the speed limit. The speed limits of some roads isn’t fed to the GPS system, so a driver will get blared at for doing 55mph in what the GPS thinks is a 35mph zone, but that’s a different story. :)

Fortunately for our company, HAL hires its own truckers for the most part. They are trained not only to drive but to operate our pumping equipment. Yes, they get tired. Sometimes, it really is wiser to sleep on location or at a truck stop rather than drive four or five hours back to the field camp or directly to the next job. HAL promotes safety among its employees, and we mandate that our employees to stop what they are doing if they can’t do it safely. People do not pay for our services, much less the premium we ask for, if we do not do our job correctly and safely.

People simply operate differently. Some people need six hours of sleep, while others need eight or more. The latest DOT regulations require 10 hours of complete down time between work-related activities. That is inefficiency that Mexican trucking is likely to take advantage of.

The move to block Mexican trucking will keep the cost of our goods up, and reduce the number of people who work. People will need to cut costs elsewhere and pay fewer non-truckers in order to pay for trucking costs that are higher than necessary.