Hello to all truckers. You keep the country running. I am wondering how you feel about the high cost of diesel (and of course gasoline too. I believe some of the truckers went on strike in the 70's and I wonder if that is a possibility now. I know many of you are not independents but these prices impact everyone. Your families at home are paying gouging prices for gas. I do not know how the people with low paying jobs can afford to drive to work. People seem to be just accepting this but it is unconscionable.

We are retired and bought an old diesel pusher motor home a few years ago. We are middle class and our dream was to travel. We saved for years to do that. We are still going away for the winter but we don't know how much longer we can afford it. We cut corners every way we can to afford the fuel. our motor home is extremely well built and at the time we got it diesel was cheaper than gas. It is just horrible what the oil companies and government are doing to us. Do any of you truckers feel strongly about this and do you think we can do anything. I think you all have more clout than any individual would. Any comments are appreciated.

Company drivers do not pay for the fuel so they do not care.
Lease operators and o/o's get a fuel surcharge of around .30 cpm on top of their normal rate of pay so the surchsrge actually drops the out of pocket cost on the fuel to around a buck a gallon (depending upon the mpg the driver gets for his truck).

Small o/o's not leased to large companies may not have a fuel surcharge built into their contracts with the shippers so these are the guys that are going out of business.

As for the cost of fuel going down forget about it. The world economies are ramping up with the likes of China and India demanding more and more oil to produce cheap goods that are then exported to the USA.
Just my opinion here of course but I believe we will see close to 4.00 per gallon by the end of next year.

You said you are retired and are traveling in a diesel pusher. I think this is a big mistake and you should seriously consider selling it before the values on these behemoths drop even further.
A better solution to your cost of fuel and desire to travel would be to downsize to 1 of the class b motorhomes or even a class c "Sprinter" that has been converted to a motor home. The costs are much more reasonable and the fuel economy is much improved as compared to the diesel pushers.

Not true, most do care and in some way everybody is affected by high fuel prices.....

Anything you can do about it? not really to be honest... America has been spoiled in some sense with low fuel cost...Compared to most countries income/fuel cost we was among the lowest... China is buying up every drop of oil they can get their hands on (India as well but not at the rate China is) So anything we can do about it? No.... Demand and supply issue..

Sure people say well just produce more... Well when you have corrupt organizations such as OPEC this will not happen... soon as they see the barrel price dropping they lower production... 60% of the worlds oil is controlled by these idiots and our goverment supports them... Goes to show our goverment is just as corrupt...

The dollar is at an all time low and the budget is just ridiculous...
You can blame goverment for shifting money to such countries like Russia (let me remind you is still our ENEMY and would love to get rid of us..)
causing the dollar to fall...

You have Sub prime loans effecting this country big time...
Government is talking about bailing these people out...

No good jobs left for low educated individuals to work.... No factories such as Ford, Chrysler, GE, Thomson consumer electronics...
They used to pay $15, 20, 25, 28, 30 an hour
Government has now out sourced all those high paying jobs to other countries and want you to work at Walmart for $8 an hr
America is a huge warehouse and no real good jobs left for the low educated... (or VERY VERY LIMITED)... even if you have a college degree they want you to start working for 10,12 an hour LOL

China and Japan produce 500,000 engineers a year
America produces about 60,000 a year
To be the best you have to have innovation and we are losing....

1/4 people in America are here illegal

I could go on with the issues we have to fix in this country

Even with a fuel surcharge its still expensive. I'm still scratching my head how diesel is more expensive than premium gas being its the least refined.

Its too bad the goverment does not step foward and regulate it like they should, there is also no reason the independent states dont lower the tax on oil products.

This is a "MYTH"
Desil is not cheaper to refine nor is it a "by" product of gasoline... They are all produced at once.... Cost is directly related to type of crude oil being used as well the refining process.....

Read this and you should not be scratching your head anymore, educating others when they say "desil should be cheaper becuase its a by product"


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Actually i dont mind the high prices. It hurts but at same time i thinks its slowly herding people towards better solutions like biodiesel, ethanol, electric, etc. Even if diesel is cheap i wouldn't feel good about buying it because the pollutants are not good for us or everything else on the planet. We need to look at the long term effects of things instead of the short future. If the majority of states voted on only having gasoline hybrids, electric, and diesel hybrids all the automotive companies would forced to progress. Combine this with highly fuel effecient cars we can make enough biodiesel here at home to support our trucking industry.

"China and Japan produce 500,000 engineers a year
America produces about 60,000 a year
To be the best you have to have innovation and we are losing...."

Not to change the subject, but...

Our government at the electronic industry's behest, started by shipping the technical positions out of the country in the late eighties. NAFTA accelerated the process, and soon industry found that it could outsource it's educated labor costs as well. We don't make anything here anymore, so we don't need engineers. Don't know why ya'll started trucking, but I started because my engineering career went down the tubes!

A good way to get unemployed these days is to get an engineering degree. Tell your kids to go to law school, or start driving!

Ironpony

I as well was an engineer and found myself being pushed out of the market from India and China.... So, yes I do know exactly what you are speaking of far as jobs go here in the US.... The problem is cheaper labor is always more attractive to corporations.... They always want to maximize their profit even at the cost of their country... They don't care about anything except $$$$$$$$ very sad they can be so greedy...

The government should regulate oil prices to help us out!??? I can't believe... Where to start... The biggest U.S. owned oil company is Exxon. They provide a grand total of 3% of the United states oil, gas, lp, etc. Let me reiterate, We have to buy, on the world market, 97% of our total supplies from the world market. Diesel fuel is the fuel that changes 3rd world countries into 1st world Societies. D-9's don't run on sunshine. The Simple fact is that the rest of the world (India and China) is also developing at an explosive rate and diesel is the fuel. So with demand exploding everyone is searching for new supplies of the black gold, well except us, ham stringed by ultra over regulating federal government. Mexico is going to be drilling off our coasts if we aren't careful, oh yea, and selling it back to us. All because of the al gore types the sky is falling, the sky is falling. The global warming idiots should go tell the chinese that they can't cook in the street with coal anymore. But America is the big polluter. These folks can continue self loathing when their gov. price controls let us relive the 1970's 3 mile waiting lines at empty gas stations.

Great post Hilo!