Business

The shipping industry in the United States has the opportunity in the next 18 months to dramatically improve its efficiency and ability to compete in the global economy.

The head of Daimler AG’s truck unit said worldwide truck demand may take several more years to return to pre-recession levels, Bloomberg reported Wednesday.

Wholesale inventories fell 0.2% in January, the Commerce Department said Wednesday.

The American Transportation Research Institute said it is seeking data from motor carriers for a study of the impacts of hours-of-service rules.

A severe budget shortfall has forced Kansas Gov. Mark Parkinson (D) to ask the state legislature to agree to the cancellation of state road projects for next year and for the remainder of the current fiscal year that ends June 30.

Several U.S. senators have criticized the Obama administration’s plan to use $4 billion to create a new national infrastructure bank to help finance transportation projects, questioning how the bank would operate and whether rural projects would lose funding to larger urban areas.

Navistar International Corp. said Tuesday it is expanding its financing relationship with GE Capital, under which GE will become Navistar’s preferred financing provider for Navistar’s U.S. trucks and school buses.

Nearly 90 proposals in 24 states and Congress would “undercut” independent contractor classification and subject carriers using owner-operators to “greater scrutiny and exposure,” according to a new American Trucking Associations’ owner-operator classification alert.