A big shout-out to all 15,000 of our team members and our dedicated suppliers that have worked hard and stepped up during this difficult period to continue meeting our customers' needs.
For the fourth quarter, we delivered sales of nearly $1.8 billion and adjusted earnings per share of $1.30.
This is important as we were able to grow adjusted operating income in our defense, fire & emergency and commercial segments over the prior year while achieving consolidated adjusted decremental margins of 19%.
In our largest segment, access equipment, we delivered 23% adjusted decremental margins during the quarter where revenues were down nearly 40%.
Finally, we are announcing a 10% increase to our quarterly cash dividend to $0.33 per share.
For example, our access equipment segment overcame a nearly $1.6 billion year-over-year sales decline to deliver an impressive 8.5% full year adjusted operating margin.
Our commercial segment posted a decade-plus high full year adjusted operating income margin of 7.5%.
Sales for the quarter were down nearly 40%, and we're therefore continuing to operate our facilities on reduced schedules.
Through the first quarter, we'll keep production lower by operating our U.S. facilities for approximately 50% of the available production weeks.
Despite these challenges, which we experienced more intensively late in the fourth quarter and continued to experience earlier this month, our operations teams have delivered solid results for our U.S. government customer and grew revenues in the year by more than 11%.
Our team was happy to receive an expected order for 322 JLTVs from the Belgian Ministry of Defense in October.
It used to be rare that the government required a CR to fund spending, but over the last 10 to 12 years, CRs have become the norm.
Fire & emergency delivered an all-time record for quarterly adjusted operating income of 16.4% in the fourth quarter.
We are exiting the year with a strong backlog, supported by a record order year of nearly $1.3 billion despite the negative impacts of COVID-19.
Much of our recent success stems from simplification efforts and disciplined cost management as well as the ramp-up of our new S-Series 2.0 Front Discharge Concrete Mixer, which is driving a lot of excitement and helping us win new customers.
Strong execution allowed us to deliver 19% adjusted decremental margins on a consolidated basis and 23% adjusted decremental margins at access equipment in the fourth quarter.
Consolidated net sales for the quarter were $1.8 billion, down 18.7% from the prior year quarter.
A 39% decrease in access equipment segment sales was the primary driver of the decrease.
Consolidated adjusted operating income for the fourth quarter was $124.1 million or 7% of sales compared to $203.1 million or 9.2% of sales in the prior year quarter.
Adjusted earnings per share for the quarter was $1.30 compared to earnings per share of $2.17 in the fourth quarter of 2019.
Fourth quarter results benefited by $0.02 per share from share repurchases completed in the prior 12 months.
Finally, we generated strong free cash flow during the quarter to drive full year free cash flow of $238 million.
Taking these factors into account, including the ongoing uncertainty of the pandemic, we're not in a position to provide quantitative expectations for 2021 at this time.
In the second quarter of 2020, we implemented decisive actions which reduced our 2020 pre-tax cost by approximately $120 million.
Additionally, we discussed permanent cost reduction actions during our last earnings call in the access equipment and commercial segments totaling $30 million to $35 million once complete.
We expect these actions will benefit 2021 by approximately $20 million.
Recently, we implemented additional permanent cost reductions totaling $15 million for 2021, which reduced corporate and segment operating expenses.
So we expect to benefit from a total of $35 million of permanent cost reductions in 2021, growing to $45 million to $50 million by 2022.
Our balance sheet remains strong with available liquidity of approximately $1.4 billion, consisting of cash of approximately $600 million and availability under our revolving line of credit of approximately $800 million.
We expect a modest increase in capital expenditures to approximately $120 million in 2021.
We just completed the year in which we delivered nearly $5 of adjusted earnings per share in the midst of a global pandemic, and we believe we are in a great position moving into 2021 with our strong balance sheet and cash position.

Summary:
For the fourth quarter, we delivered sales of nearly $1.8 billion and adjusted earnings per share of $1.30.
Finally, we are announcing a 10% increase to our quarterly cash dividend to $0.33 per share.
Consolidated net sales for the quarter were $1.8 billion, down 18.7% from the prior year quarter.
Adjusted earnings per share for the quarter was $1.30 compared to earnings per share of $2.17 in the fourth quarter of 2019.
Taking these factors into account, including the ongoing uncertainty of the pandemic, we're not in a position to provide quantitative expectations for 2021 at this time.