Cascade Business News, February 16, 2021— If you’re a truck driver, you’re also a business concern, and eligible for a number of money-saving tax deductions. “Trucking isn’t just a job,” says Advanced Training Systems CEO John Kearney. “It’s a profession, and treated as such by the Internal Revenue Service. My advice to drivers, whatever their employment category, is simple: learn the rules, keep orderly records and get your returns in on time.” The IRS requires you to keep receipts and for your business expenses for at least three years after the date of filing your return and longer in certain circumstances.
In addition to deductions for individual drivers, notes Kearney, economic incentives are increasingly being offered to the trucking industry as a whole. Although the motor freight industry is essential to the U.S. economy — over 70 percent of all American freight moves by truck— its growth and future are endangered by a persistent and growing shortage of drivers.
Meanwhile, the COVID-19 pandemic, which has closed stores and offices across the nation in 2020, caused a year-over-year U.S. jump in e-commerce of more than 30 percent. In response, global big-box and e-commerce retailers are building distribution centers all over the country to facilitate faster deliveries and shorter routes, creating hundreds of thousands if not millions of new jobs.
“We don’t know for sure how many of these new positions will be for drivers,” says Kearney, “but informally we know it’s a lot. We’re in touch with these companies, who are interested in simulation not only because it produces better, safer drivers, but because of the potential return on investment. Except for the very final stages of training, it eliminates the need to tie up a truck and a licensed driver. The simulator realistically reproduces every possible driving situation, including some — black ice patches on the road, a steering tire blowout — that you can’t train for any other way. It’s as necessary as simulation training for pilots, and for the same reasons: honing professional skills and saving people’s lives.”
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Advanced Training Systems has revolutionized the design and manufacture of high-tech simulators to improve driver training and create both better drivers and a safer world. In addition to hundreds of driving schools, we provide equipment and support for major shippers who do their own training, as well as customized solutions for those with particular training needs. For more information or to schedule a demo, please contact us here.