At least in terms of the case in that article, aiui, the pandemic provided an opening because there was a sudden calamitous shortage of truck drivers, so in a sense the fees were "justified." Then beyond that my personal explanation would be the fatal logic of capitalism: you can't justify turning down profits to your shareholders even if you're obtaining them illegally.
And that basic pandemic-as-crisis-point worked in lots of economic sectors, plus it provided a sort of general smokescreen for social change
― rob, Wednesday, 6 July 2022 14:56 (one year ago) link