Overtime pay ! Make it happen .

Good for Canada.

I would like to see it happen here. We are equivalent to commercial pilots when it comes to our physicals so it would be an equalizer for us.

The problem I have is bakers are considered skilled trade workers, that's really not a good thing.

 

Exactly, we are expected to keep in good health, remain drug/alcohol free, pass physicals, keep up to date on the ever-changing HOS, operate in a safe manner, know how to load freight to be within legal weight limits, and so forth...... Yet some people on here will say trucking is not a skilled profession because it take three weeks to get a CDL. Passing the CDL test is just the "certification" if you will. No company would hand you the keys right after passing the CDL exam. You are sent with a trainer for six to eight weeks to learn how to do the job. Even after you go solo the company will hold your hand for a month or two since you're still green. That I would consider a skilled profession.

Anybody can get the recipe online and bake cookies or a cake by themselves. You can't take a person off the street, give them a 5 minute crash course, and expect them to jump in a truck and move freight.

 

I agree on trying to make it happen,it is a big waste of time.Of course drivers should get paid something for the hrs to days of downtime they have while sitting at a truckstop waiting for a load.Afterall they didn't ask to sit and sit and didn't get hired to sit.The problem is companies hire more drivers then freight and I imagine for some companies it's because of the subsidy money from the government.If miles were consistent week after week then we wouldn't be having a discussion about the pay.

 

Nonsense.. Trucking has gotten nothing but easier for the drivers.. If you don't want to do the job, don't. but You're not Mother Theresa.. If you want the government to make this a "skilled profession" then get ready for the flood of truckers from other parts of the world that will do this cheaper and probably better than most of the homegrown types here. Most drivers here barely competent.. not professional at all.

 

My problem with the original Posting was the fact where we all pay a little bit and could solve our problems. The poster is brand new to this board and already wants to solve our problems. I have twice been nominated for US Congress. Lost badly. Okay. I tried so now lets deal with reality.

Truckers are very independent people. "Don't haul cheap freight." You will hear that from Owner Operators all the time but everyone does at sometime or another. We are not a regulated industry anymore. There is competition for every load. The main weapon we have is a lower price. So we undercut each other. Brokers take advantage of that. I have a new truck and new trailer. I want a certain percent of profit for my business and a certain paycheck to me the driver. That puts my bottom line at $1.84 per mile. If I can't get that rate will I take less? Depends on how much less and where the load is going to. Now you get it to where no one takes a load for less then $3.00 plus fsc, I will back you. But then again, I might just say I back you and haul the load for $2.90 a mile.

The idea you are talking about is called "Enlightened self interest." We need to understand that sometimes acting in our own self interest is actually hurting us. Working for Mega Companies hurts the driver. J. B. Hunt use to brag about only needing $1.00 per day per truck to make him very rich. Large companies can undercut the single truck owner with no problem. Walmart came in an destroyed the small towns of America but those same people who were destroyed shopped Walmart.

And by the way, overtime is governed by the Department of Labor. We are under the Department of Transportation. I am very much pro Teamsters and pro Union on almost all matters. I just happen to be a Republican.

We should stand together. But we will never do so. Hell, we let them tell us we can't use the left lane even though the left lane was engineered to be the thru lane.

 

How so? In the last ten years we were introduced to CSA, PSP, having to register your physical at the DMV, the crackdown on obese drivers with the sleep test BS, now they're working on a system to prevent drivers from doctor shopping. The foreign drivers are nothing new, from the Eastern Europeans in Chicago to the Punjabis in Northern California.

 

This craigslist a,d looking for construction drivers only the driver must do his own oil change and fix tires on his trk or trailer.I had some fun with this guy about his ad this emails.He recently posted his ad again only left out oil changing and tires.Drivers aren't going to do extra work unless they get paid for it.

 

Amazing how many drivers think drivers should be licking management's ###, thanking management for a job and begging management for another bite of a #### sandwich.

These fools think the solution to every problem is "If you don't like it, leave."

Why do so many drivers suffer from such a perverted case of Stockholm Syndrome.