While it is admirable for children to be independent and gainfully employed, our children got their parents to move out. Actually I got a contract in Germany and our children who are all working are house sitting while their parents gallivant (actually working) across Europe ;-)
Isn't truck driving the same industry that had such a glut a few years ago that going rates were high enough that companies could barely pay for gas for the trucks?
At least truck drivers don't have to worry about their jobs being exported to India. Even high-paying, degreed jobs in accounting, computer programming, and engineering are being exported to other countries.
There is a line in the book, Job Creation Tax Plan, something to the effect that truck driver jobs are safe in this country until some technical wizard figures a way for truck drivers in India, China, and the Philippines to drive trucks in the United States by remote control.
The only real shortage in trucking is caused by the massive over regulation and general treatment of drivers as less than human. They've been running those ads for years and it's never been true. Don't fall for the bait. You'll likely just end up as more meat for the grinder.
I'm out of that, going back to college (with a real major) and driving a school bus on the side for extra cash. My only regret is not doing this sooner.
(((kajidono said... The only real shortage in trucking is caused by the massive over regulation and general treatment of drivers as less than human. They've been running those ads for years and it's never been true. Don't fall for the bait. You'll likely just end up as more meat for the grinder.)))
So truck-driving school is a scam? About 20 years ago, I had an aunt (a worthless human if there ever was one) who attended flight steward school hosted by the airline. She graduated, but never actually did a flight.
See for yourself: http://www.thetruckersreport.com/driver-i-was-brutally-beaten-by-california-highway-patrol-officers/?utm_source=The+TruckersReport+Weekly+Newsletter+Recipients&utm_campaign=97a0196bdd-Weekly_Newsletter_Test_Campaign1_25_2013&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_de09ecb18a-97a0196bdd-38451257
There is a shortage of truck drivers because the industry suckers drivers into eating transport and regulation costs.
Drivers are expected to own their own rigs, and often their own trailers, and pay for their maint out of pocket, as well as finance their purchase themselves.
They get paid a lot, but their expenses are horrendous ... and they can't compete with Mexican drivers who ignore regulations, and drive company owned rigs.
So yea, they are running out of suckers, as truckers wise up, sell their rigs, and GTFO.
Not all vocational schools will get you a good job ...
Yeah, most of them are a scam. I does not cost several thousand dollars to learn to drive a truck, but that's what you'll owe them if you don't finish out the contract to drive for them for a certain amount of time. Whether you can actually make a living during that time doesn't matter to them. In fact, some of them would rather you run for a bit then clear that seat out so they can get another sucker in there for a while. I also hear that they get government finds for every student they can cram through their school, so it's in their best interest to have a 150% or higher turnover rate.
Now that doesn't mean that all schools are scams or all companies are run like that but as the new guy, that's where this shortage of drivers is that they keep talking about and those are the openings most likely to be available to you.
Think about it: if a career really is good, it would be hard to get into since the old timers will stay there until the hearse carries them out, like in USW organized steel mills, US Steel and Mittal for example. One Mittal plant in West Virginia has 70 for the average age of its staff! But look at the want ads, and you'll see ads for truck driving as numerous as stars in the sky. By Chicago, CR England trains and hires 30 drivers per week, every week, and that's one of many companies, and one of their many training facilities.
The driver is held responsible for a lot that is out of his hands. You sign a daily inspection report, but a lot of equipment is dog-eared, but if you fuss and force them to fix it, you're a problem employee, and they'll gin up a reason to can you. If you refuse bad equipment or dispatches, they have a stack of resumes from which to choose your replacement in 5 minutes, someone desperate enough to run out of hours or unsafe. Drivers will pull into a weigh station, swing around back, and come in to ask the trooper to deadline a truck whose brakes or tires the employer flat out refuses to fix, forcing a state mandated repair where the driver would otherwise be ignored.
I know you won't like me saying something good about unions here, but see the 10% turnover line (mostly due to retirement, death, bad MVR, or failed DOT physical) for the less than truckload graph line, while large and small truckload are near or over 100%? Your LTL's are Roadway, ABF, and UPS, Teamster shops, where the driver can make the company run good equipment and fair work rules, and drivers can't be popped for requiring that. Those drivers are truly captains of their ships with real say-so. Your non-union shops like JB Hunt, Schneider, Swift, if the driver doesn't like his rig or his hours or pay, don't let the door hit you on the way out, we train newbies every day, so long sucker. And so you have the revolving door.
Pretty soon truck-driving son will be joining doctorate in english kid.
Oh, and this is happening in every profession.
Did you bother to spend years of your life trying to save lives as a surgeon?
See: Intuitive Surgery
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLj4ImsVkDQ
How much would you wager that the Da Vinci systems are data-mining all the surgeries done on them by the surgeons who use them? Pretty soon they'll be doing some on their own.
I work at an intermodal railyard and deal with hundreds of truck drivers every day. For at least 50% of the drivers English is their second language. Just about every country in the world is represented in great numbers EXCEPT for the western European ones. Among the American drivers, at least 50% are black. This is that other America you keep hearing about: the barely hanging on working class.
Most of the nice, urban middle class readers of this and other manosphere blogs, who opine so ceaselessly on maleness, would faint from disgust if exposed to this environment. I myself did, but I really needed the job so I've become used to it. Also, my husband drives a truck, so I have the drivers' perspective.
If you can adjust to the challenges of the job, which mainly require patience and intelligence, truck driving isn't a bad way to make a living. The schooling to get a CDL costs much less and is shorter than for other certification programs, like welding or heavy equipment operating.
I cannot speak for the rest of the readers here, but I shoveled shit in the 7th grade. I'd imagine most of the readers here CAN imagine poor working conditions as they probably did work horrible jobs at some point in their lives.
Miss Conduct, then you see the daily parade of Polish, Mexican, Russian, and Arabic "undocumented workers" who turn in their J2's at your ingate. Many of these don't bother locking the containers to the chassis, and when they hook and drop, they raise the dollies three turns off the ground and drag them, or bang trailers together, it's not their equipment, and if they get caught damaging equipment, it's back to the Old Country with their pay, never to be extradited.
Meanwhile, American drivers who get canned, whether for true bad conduct or not, have the DAC report that can blacklist them from the industry based on the word of the firing employer. Technically, you can appeal your last company's review, but they pay DAC's fee, not the driver, so the chance of an amended review are nil.
I started driving a year ago, but I sure didn't sign on as a contract driver. I got my CDL before I got hired. First smart move.
Didn't fuck up for the first 6 months, didn't get any points or tickets. Jumped ship from first company to a much better outfit. NOT UNION! It's a great company and they pay us extra to recruit new drivers because they don't advertise.
While it is admirable for children to be independent and gainfully employed, our children got their parents to move out. Actually I got a contract in Germany and our children who are all working are house sitting while their parents gallivant (actually working) across Europe ;-)
ReplyDeleteIsn't truck driving the same industry that had such a glut a few years ago that going rates were high enough that companies could barely pay for gas for the trucks?
ReplyDeleteAt least truck drivers don't have to worry about their jobs being exported to India. Even high-paying, degreed jobs in accounting, computer programming, and engineering are being exported to other countries.
ReplyDeleteThere is a line in the book, Job Creation Tax Plan, something to the effect that truck driver jobs are safe in this country until some technical wizard figures a way for truck drivers in India, China, and the Philippines to drive trucks in the United States by remote control.
The only real shortage in trucking is caused by the massive over regulation and general treatment of drivers as less than human. They've been running those ads for years and it's never been true. Don't fall for the bait. You'll likely just end up as more meat for the grinder.
ReplyDeleteI'm out of that, going back to college (with a real major) and driving a school bus on the side for extra cash. My only regret is not doing this sooner.
Ah, so you *do* have a son!
ReplyDelete;)
(((kajidono said...
ReplyDeleteThe only real shortage in trucking is caused by the massive over regulation and general treatment of drivers as less than human. They've been running those ads for years and it's never been true. Don't fall for the bait. You'll likely just end up as more meat for the grinder.)))
So truck-driving school is a scam? About 20 years ago, I had an aunt (a worthless human if there ever was one) who attended flight steward school hosted by the airline. She graduated, but never actually did a flight.
I think I see a pattern here.....
See for yourself: http://www.thetruckersreport.com/driver-i-was-brutally-beaten-by-california-highway-patrol-officers/?utm_source=The+TruckersReport+Weekly+Newsletter+Recipients&utm_campaign=97a0196bdd-Weekly_Newsletter_Test_Campaign1_25_2013&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_de09ecb18a-97a0196bdd-38451257
ReplyDeleteThere is a shortage of truck drivers because the industry suckers drivers into eating transport and regulation costs.
ReplyDeleteDrivers are expected to own their own rigs, and often their own trailers, and pay for their maint out of pocket, as well as finance their purchase themselves.
They get paid a lot, but their expenses are horrendous ... and they can't compete with Mexican drivers who ignore regulations, and drive company owned rigs.
So yea, they are running out of suckers, as truckers wise up, sell their rigs, and GTFO.
Not all vocational schools will get you a good job ...
@Phil
ReplyDeleteYeah, most of them are a scam. I does not cost several thousand dollars to learn to drive a truck, but that's what you'll owe them if you don't finish out the contract to drive for them for a certain amount of time. Whether you can actually make a living during that time doesn't matter to them. In fact, some of them would rather you run for a bit then clear that seat out so they can get another sucker in there for a while. I also hear that they get government finds for every student they can cram through their school, so it's in their best interest to have a 150% or higher turnover rate.
Now that doesn't mean that all schools are scams or all companies are run like that but as the new guy, that's where this shortage of drivers is that they keep talking about and those are the openings most likely to be available to you.
Think about it: if a career really is good, it would be hard to get into since the old timers will stay there until the hearse carries them out, like in USW organized steel mills, US Steel and Mittal for example. One Mittal plant in West Virginia has 70 for the average age of its staff! But look at the want ads, and you'll see ads for truck driving as numerous as stars in the sky. By Chicago, CR England trains and hires 30 drivers per week, every week, and that's one of many companies, and one of their many training facilities.
ReplyDeleteThe driver is held responsible for a lot that is out of his hands. You sign a daily inspection report, but a lot of equipment is dog-eared, but if you fuss and force them to fix it, you're a problem employee, and they'll gin up a reason to can you. If you refuse bad equipment or dispatches, they have a stack of resumes from which to choose your replacement in 5 minutes, someone desperate enough to run out of hours or unsafe. Drivers will pull into a weigh station, swing around back, and come in to ask the trooper to deadline a truck whose brakes or tires the employer flat out refuses to fix, forcing a state mandated repair where the driver would otherwise be ignored.
I know you won't like me saying something good about unions here, but see the 10% turnover line (mostly due to retirement, death, bad MVR, or failed DOT physical) for the less than truckload graph line, while large and small truckload are near or over 100%? Your LTL's are Roadway, ABF, and UPS, Teamster shops, where the driver can make the company run good equipment and fair work rules, and drivers can't be popped for requiring that. Those drivers are truly captains of their ships with real say-so. Your non-union shops like JB Hunt, Schneider, Swift, if the driver doesn't like his rig or his hours or pay, don't let the door hit you on the way out, we train newbies every day, so long sucker. And so you have the revolving door.
Has nobody on here googled driverless trucks?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/11/26/autonomous_mining_trucks/
http://news.discovery.com/autos/future-of-transportation/driverless-trucks-debut-in-japan-130304.htm
Pretty soon truck-driving son will be joining doctorate in english kid.
Oh, and this is happening in every profession.
Did you bother to spend years of your life trying to save lives as a surgeon?
See: Intuitive Surgery
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLj4ImsVkDQ
How much would you wager that the Da Vinci systems are data-mining all the surgeries done on them by the surgeons who use them? Pretty soon they'll be doing some on their own.
See cryptogon for more stories like these.
I work at an intermodal railyard and deal with hundreds of truck drivers every day. For at least 50% of the drivers English is their second language. Just about every country in the world is represented in great numbers EXCEPT for the western European ones. Among the American drivers, at least 50% are black. This is that other America you keep hearing about: the barely hanging on working class.
ReplyDeleteMost of the nice, urban middle class readers of this and other manosphere blogs, who opine so ceaselessly on maleness, would faint from disgust if exposed to this environment. I myself did, but I really needed the job so I've become used to it. Also, my husband drives a truck, so I have the drivers' perspective.
If you can adjust to the challenges of the job, which mainly require patience and intelligence, truck driving isn't a bad way to make a living. The schooling to get a CDL costs much less and is shorter than for other certification programs, like welding or heavy equipment operating.
Miss Conduct,
ReplyDeleteI cannot speak for the rest of the readers here, but I shoveled shit in the 7th grade. I'd imagine most of the readers here CAN imagine poor working conditions as they probably did work horrible jobs at some point in their lives.
Miss Conduct, then you see the daily parade of Polish, Mexican, Russian, and Arabic "undocumented workers" who turn in their J2's at your ingate. Many of these don't bother locking the containers to the chassis, and when they hook and drop, they raise the dollies three turns off the ground and drag them, or bang trailers together, it's not their equipment, and if they get caught damaging equipment, it's back to the Old Country with their pay, never to be extradited.
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, American drivers who get canned, whether for true bad conduct or not, have the DAC report that can blacklist them from the industry based on the word of the firing employer. Technically, you can appeal your last company's review, but they pay DAC's fee, not the driver, so the chance of an amended review are nil.
I started driving a year ago, but I sure didn't sign on as a contract driver. I got my CDL before I got hired. First smart move.
ReplyDeleteDidn't fuck up for the first 6 months, didn't get any points or tickets. Jumped ship from first company to a much better outfit. NOT UNION! It's a great company and they pay us extra to recruit new drivers because they don't advertise.