Peterbilt permanently closing Nashville plant

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Aww man.

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- Some people get lost in thought cause it's unfamiliar territory to them.

thirty bucks an hour in pay & benefits & they weren't happy that they were going to have a copay on there ins. wonder how much of a copay they will have to pay now with no job.

Wait...are you talking about Peterbilt or GM?

since when is 30 an hour with pay AND benefits too much? A job i just left paid 32 an hour WITH benefits, but top rate was only 16.75. The rest went into pension and h&w. So if they are only making 30 an hour, TOTAL, i would have been looking for a better job anyway.

I'm failing to see your arguement here, and waiting, since someone brought up GM, to hear you tell me about the "greedy uaw workers that make 70 dollars an hour". They make about 38 an hour, WITH benefits. hourly rate is around 25 an hour, and with their h&w and pension, it bumps it up to 38.

and if you would be happy with less than the peterbilt workers, good for you. But dont try and dump on the last of the middle class thats trying to not get cut down.

the point is they had a damn good job & were too stupid to realize it. there are a lot of middle class working people who would love to have a job like the peterbilt workers had. 30,40,50 dollars an hour pay & benefits included & when they are told they are going to have to start paying a copay on their ins. they think it is so unfair. when the unemployment runs out & the ones who have to have a job start looking for one then they might realize they would have been better of where they were. i dont feel sorry for the pro union workers, i feel sorry for the people who just wanted to go to work & support there families,without all the union b.s.

Hey gone.
If you were making that money in Western Ny then you were making bookoo bucks.
At least where I am. The cost of living is very very low. At 16 an hour you have a nice house and a decend used car.
At 20+ an hour you have a nice house, new cars ect and maybe some toys if you want.
Most people pay copays with insurance, and most not in HMO's have a deductable.
It is just the way insurance is these days, and I don't fault them for it.
But if these guys were really on strike over that, and getting good pay. Then the company probibly did the right thing in cutting its losses.
I feel bad for the average worker there, but the union guys slit there necks.

They just moved to headquarters in Denton. No union shutdowns or threats of such. Only talked to a few who have worked there. No complaints. You don't toss out ultimatums to an employer. At least not when the economy is in the toilet unless you have a bunch of greedy inept reps. Well the world needs ditch diggers too.

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chromedome, I dont live too far from you, just about an hour away. there is still no way that 16 an hour is big bucks. sorry, not buying it, not when people were making that 20 years ago when the cost of living was MUCH lower than it is now.

kwswan, i just told you i stepped out of a job making 32 TOTAL, and was only getting an hourly rate of 16.75. you think 16.75 is middle class? no way, maybe over 20/hr, no WAY at 16.75. you say that there are a lot of "middle class working people" who would love to have that job. maybe you are right, but if the union had not bargained for those wages, who says it would have EVER been a good job?

Like i said, i made 32 an hour (supposedly, thats what the owner said we cost) but only saw 16.75. We took a pay cut(copay on h&w) and it was no longer worth the 70 mile round trip into buffalo every day. If I had the opportunity to go on strike, I would have done it in a second.

Maybe these people aim a little higher than most of the people on here. It is definetly stupid to tell other people in the working world what they are NOT worth, because then all that does is eventually cut EVERYONE down, like all the drivers with no overtime, crappy high copays, and irregular/or no hometime. Great, sign me up for one of those "middle class" .28 cpm jobs, or one of those "middle class" 15 dollar an hour jobs.

Ok, maybe not quite big bucks. But you can live very comfortable at that pay.
I have a decent house in a good part of town. My car is paid for, my wife is paying for hers. We are paying all our bills easy with her pay and my unemployment. Her pay is ok, but not great.
My morgage payment is only 380 a month. House cost 35k. That is cheap lol.
I could get a house just as nice out in the country near here with some land for around 100k.
To put this into perspective. I grew up in Maryland. The house I am in now would cost well over 150k in Southern MD. The house in the country would be 300-550k.
We are living in a very low cost area. It is higher around Buffalo, I can totally agree with that, and the standard of living for the money would be much lower up there. Espically the way the economy is now.
Around Jamestown a local Union Driving job pays around 14-18 an hour (driving a mixer). A non union local driving job will be 11-15 an hour (driving A or B trucks). Ok not great money, but easy to live on if you are on a budget in this area, also 2 incomes will be best. I could live on that alone, simply because I had less debt single than I do married, and I do not need as much stuff.
Heck, if my wife had worked and paid for her college like I did, and like I paid for her Masters Degree we would have another 380 a month available to us. Her student loans for her undergrad hurt us allot.