Have I lost touch with this industry?

We ARE the modern driver ....... we may not know where we're going, but we'll get ya thar !

BTW Pete, got a call from Kevin in Danvers .... he says the infrastructure damage around Boston from the snow is unreal this year. Millions in damage everywhere ! Busted fire plugs, signs, quays, etc etc.

 

Boy has this thread taken a turn. With a 4 car trailer I would not consider this hard work. Heck I run flatbed and RGN and I don't consider that hard work either. Difficult? Yes. Do you sweat? Yes. But it is not physically demanding work. Those that think that this is work need to spend a few days on a farm doing chores. After shoveling cow excrement and throwing hay bales then you might consider that hard work. I can think of any number of jobs that are physically harder that pay considerably less than we get as drivers.

The days are long gone where the company was loyal to you and you were loyal to the company.

As for the comment that why should you make the boss more money.... Well so you can keep your job for one. Secondly, if you think you can do it better then stick your neck on the chopping block. You are not the one taking the financial risk and with small fleets, the owners make substantially less than you think they do. Most of them are leveraged to their eyeballs and one miss step you will be out of a job but they will lose it all.

I have always worked under the premise that if I make the company money they can afford to pay me more. That has worked well for 30 years of working with the exception of the one union job that I had.

I don't consider sweating hard work. Heck I sweat if the temp gets above 75... LOL

 

Right out of the park!

 

This right here is what is wrong with this country today, the me first attitude! You do a great job bringing it to light, but my question to you is, what if the soldiers that fought and died for your freedom to behave like you do had the me first attitude? Thankfully, there are many younger people that still get it otherwise we would be screwed. I laugh at the entitlement generation pointing their fingers at us, although he is right, we have raised this generation to behave the way they do and for that I have to agree with Brandson that we have failed by trying to provide a better life for our children then we had or have.

 

Stan, get a bluetooth keyboard for your tablet, I love mine, I have the tablet on a mount on my dash and use the keyboard on my steering wheel (while parked of course). This allows me access to my dispatch site that Manheim has forced down my throat without using the phone app which is cumbersome to use.

 

i am not smart enough for a tablet or my smart phone
so this laptop will have to do

 

Just saw this on FB:

 

The only thing that you are owed is food, shelter and clothing...... And that is only until you are 18 or graduate from high school which ever comes later. Oh and ok maybe an education to the high school level but calling our school system an education is a joke.

 

Hate to say this troops, but Brandson has a point. How many of us old school OTR driver have failed marriages or or know another driver who does? How many of us have grown kids who barely talk to us. How many are like me with completwly screwed up social lives?

The younger generation has seen what being an OTR driver can cost, and they aren't willing to pay. I say GOOD FOR THEM! Why should they go through the failed relationships, the divorces, the custody battles and all the other crap we went through? Just because we did? That's a BS reason that does not allow the industry to ever improve for the driver. Yes, there are still guys and gals out there who prefer to run for weeks or months at a time. But that is an ever shrinking pool of people, and to attract them you better make your company shine like a spotlight on a dark night. Cause the rest of us are either done playing the "chasing miles OTR for money" game, or aren't playing it at all.

From a driver who's been kicking around in this industry for close to twenty years, and is fed up with the whole "you gotta stay on the road forever to make any money" BS.