47 year old unemployed ex-professor

You will put in over a hundred hours a week driving OTR if you count all the time you spend sleeping. Hopefully anyone getting involved in this business will research it thoroughly. What I don't understand is how 3 years of college cost less than $3000.

 

It has been 20 years since I attended a Jr.College to get my CDL. At that time it cost $442.00 for the 6 week course. The training was certainly not the best. The school was close enough that I drove to it everyday,and brought a sack lunch. The important thing was that I graduated with a class A CDL,and plenty of job offers. I consider it the best $442.00 I ever invested.

 

And you probably made it back in the first week driving on your own too.

 

what you do during the week is irrelevant. you have to take 10 hours off each day. that leaves you 14 hours each day to drive/load/unload/shower/sit and play video games or whatever. 14 X 7 = 98. if you're home on the weekends, figure about 80 hours. what you're NOT going to do if you drive long haul is work 9-5 and then go home. how did I go to college for less than $3,000? I got grants for 3 semesters, and I didn't go to Harvard.

 

if I were smart, I wouldn't have ended up driving a truck. I just have an AAS degree. and if they hadn't switched to a "semester" system, (where they only offer classes twice a year, and none in the summer,) I would've graduated in a year and a half.

 

I am 54 years old and out of work because of this BAD economy. I worked in the printing industry for 11 years. Made over 50k a year. I worked 60 to 70 hours a week, when thing were good. But also lost alot of family life. Like most of you drivers know. I am also doing alot of reading on the trucking industry. I am finding that there is a big difference in alot of companys. I have to decide if the trucking life is for me. Concidering I cant find any work, I may have to drive. Also can we as new drivers get enough miles in a week to make a living? In the slow economy?

 

do more reading. if you drive a truck, you WON'T make 50k a year, you'll work MORE than 70 hours a week, and not see your family for weekS. you may "have" to drive? OK. good luck.

 

I'm sure the vets espically really get tired of hearing all the sob stories, follow by "it's time to try trucking", or "I think I'll try driving" like any old flunkey who's down on their luck can just jump in a cab and make some bank. I've only been around the block a time or two with trucking but it makes me sore...and it makes me laugh. I think people assume it's a job for flunkies and what every tom dick and harry should roll over to when times take a bite out of their #####...I guess chief said it best, good luck chuck, and tom, and dick and oh yeah, harry. Part of the reason a good driver can't make the kind of money he should for working 100hrs a week is we've got to many 'dicks' in the cab right now. Try a different back up plan, play something other than trucker for a while folks, your not helping the sore situation out here.

-mb

(This isn't a "lets try it, just for a min" kind of gig. It's burned in the blood or it's not, and if it's not, save us both alot of time and pain.)

 

Hey, they contribute to the 85% that WON'T last a year....... Let everyone try it, our leader will pay their way........