What am I missing?

Best post yet.

 

Poor economics? Hell, you invented a while new math.

Let's see 26 weeks ... hmm? Yep, 52 weeks in a year. So wouldn't 26 weeks be 6 months?

I have no idea how your proof got from making $11050 in 6 months to making only $8650 in 32 weeks.

Then there is the whole 70 hour work week. First you make a leap from compensated miles and translate it straight across to hours worked, presumably the HOS hours. But are not the HOS hours 70 in 8 days, not a week?

And if someone is only driving 1700 miles in a week, do you really think they are maxing out their 70 in the process?

Conservatively 1700 miles at a 45 mph moving average will take about 38 hours to run. Going across 26 weeks that's 988 hours. On $11050, that's comes out to about $11.18 an hour.

Now back to the OPs original question. Is there a driver shortage ... well, yes and no. Experienced, quality drivers are in demand, this is where the shortage is and the pay for those reflect it.

On the other side there is no shortage of people who want to enter the profession and the threshold of entry is pretty low.

So there are companies that run their business model on bringing in the inexperienced and churn them through. Then there are those who cannibalize the training companies, siphoning off their experienced drivers.

 

The post made sense when you put the first sentence last...That is some really poor economics!

 

...and those are the ones taking advantage of "corporate welfare" to get alot of cheap labor.

And I don't think his math is that far off, if he's factoring in dead time (which he likely is).

 

While I agree with your point on accounting profits vs actual profits, I am disinclined to agree with you on executive pay.

A trucker spends $5,000 on his education, works 70 hours/week, never sees his family, and earns 40,000/year. A CEO spends $300,000 on his education, works 70 hours/week, never sees his family, and earns $2,400,000/year.

 

As long as you have this cabal or cartel of the big companies that rule the roost so to speak when it comes to driver pay, they're basically greedy and have no intention of increasing driver pay. In my estimation they would like us to stay on the breadline. They will pay us just enough for us to survive and that's it. They don't want to pay us more because they want the control at all times. Perish the thought that trucking companies actually want us to be well off financially. They're not going do anyone any favors except to line their own pockets. There's no loyalty so who cares. There's driver turnover too because drivers want a change.
They would hate for us to be making over $100K a year which they could if they were motivated to do so.
Perhaps they get nice fat subsidies as long as they churn the driver population. Who really knows but if we could see a company offering 60-75c a mile, then I'm sure all heck would break loose. Can't have that though can we ?
In turn and as I'm now an O/O I get the ultimate revenge by not paying anymore tax than I have to. So I increase my net. I don't believe the IRS should get any tax at all, so my intent is to give them as little as possible, legally of course. No sin for administering tax avoidance plans, just as it's OK for companies to not pay us what we are worth.
I'm sure many guys don't agree with me, and that's OK too. That you should lay down and accept the status quo but I'm of the opinion that you have to be selfish and do what's best for you and your family. It's payback time, it's a business. I'm not here to be a friend of any company.

 

I doubt seriously that those "CEOs" work more than 30 hours a week, and they definitely don't "earn" that 2.4mil. They bang secretaries, play golf, hit strip joints, and generally rape every cent they can out of the company, while running it into the ground.

And "they paid 300k for their education"?? Like hell: mommy/daddy paid for it, they partied their way thru college and cheated on ever test they had to take (what tests daddy couldn't buy them out of), and the only thing they got out of college was their "good ol' boy network" of fellow frat boys, skilled only at stealing companies blind.

 

What kind of revenge are you getting on the corporations?? They're already employing tax-avoidance strategies, along with the corporate welfare they get; so all you're doing is hurting the people who need the services taxes pay for.

The only way we can "get" them, is to take control of our government, via our votes. And if they don't work, we have plenty of lead to use.

 

Not getting revenge on the corps my friend, you're reading my post completely wrong, but I'm not surprised. You have to do whatever is necessary to make as much as you can. I'm just glad I'm not a Co driver but the point is nothing is going to change in this world without something radical happening.
Im just expressing an opinion based on what I observe. When you see companies paying the same now as what they did in 8 yrs ago as I see with companies like Indian River Transport, one of my former cos, then something is not quite right. If they can get away with not paying you what you're worth, and the general apathy is in place, then it's business as usual

 

I can never understand why people think not paying taxes is a smart thing, given that those taxes pay for things like roads, bridges, repairs, water, sewer, police, fire protection, etc., etc...

But the pay scale bit is utterly correct: something IS wrong, and it's not just in trucking, it's EVERYWHERE right now, and it's us little guys that are suffering from it. The money we aren't earning (and others as well) isn't getting spent into the economy, which means the economy suffers, to the point where there's nothing left for the ones doing the work.