Everyone wants free training in the trucking industry.

The whole idea of return on investment is lost on most folks. You could give them "free training", if they fulfill the say 1 year contract and you paid them 30k they'd somehow be ahead (in their mind) over putting cdl school on a credit card and have made perhaps 55k that same first year. But they got the school for "free."

It all boils down to people knowing the cost of everything but the value of nothing.

 

When someone has less than 200 in there pocket. About to be or is homeless. Have no credit cards or family that will or can help. That is there only option...

Or you can pretend they have more options and wonder why they just didnt pay for cdl school. Feel smarter for being clueless?

It all boils down to means and ways. And i agree most people have no idea the cost/value of everything .why? Becaise they cant afford it anyways...

 

No. You did not get into history sufficiently deep. About the 1994 time period, there were three or so megas, JB Hunt in particular and a couple of others. They maintained training schools in one form or another. Having discovered approximately 300,000 drivers are trained and CDL'ed each year and then lost a very large portion of it within the first 3, 6 or 9 months of the first year for a variety of problems such as preventable damages, losses accidents etc. JB Hunt one day in the 90's decided... close the national schools. No more training. If you wanted to work for them, get your own CDL.

In the 80's Uncle Sam paid my trucking school 2500 in the form of student loans just the same as college loans. Poof I got my class A. Eventually I repaid that loan. Nothing is free. You are still investing in your own future.

What became a BIG problem recently as of roughly 2005 onwards is that trucking companies indentured new drivers to offer paid training at a price of 12 months labor to be given back to them under contract signed by the newbie. The problem is no one told the student signing that note the fact that he or she can be dismissed, fired or terminated for any number of preventable and then charged legally against their credit for the remaining thousands of unpaid tuition dollars.

You can argue that Uncle Sam is complict in companies wooing overseas people to come here and hire on at a bunch of money per head, tax free or otherwise. Pay them the .34 cents a mile and they don't understand that rate has been around 30 years plus. If they did they would demand say .70 a mile. Which no trucking company is willing to pay. Thus the cry "DRIVER SHORTAGE" collectively rises. (What BS, Boo hoo. That can be eliminated in 15 minutes with a update in pay of at least .80 a mile or better 1.00 to the company hand regardless of experience.) Everyone will flock to hire on.

And so the world turns. No one wants to do what I did once, take on a job at night doing dishes in a fast food until I had a couple thousand as I did once. It only took a few months to get it in hand.

People always think they can pick up gold nuggets every mile out there on the big road with a 18 wheeler. Never about how much it will cost them to do the work in terms of annual food costs and so on. (I estimate it at about 8000 give or take per year) that's 21 dollars daily, you can do well on two meals retail bought or half that fixing it yourself in the cab off the inverter or dutch ovens.

The minute they get a job and start taking home or spending 1000 dollars a week, they NEVER... EVER immediately pay back the company tution note that they signed. Then one day they scrape a phone pole and do 300 dollars in equiptment damage and get fired. Boo hoo I say.

 

I agree with you. Are most of the people in this category there due to circumstances beyond their control?
A lot of people have absolutely no idea how money works. It's why you can pay people 30k or 200k and the one who is wise with money gets by just fine and the one who is an idiot is always broke.

Some people could use the company sponsored cdl training and come out better than they were before. How many of them do you think still have maybe $200 to their name even when they get the cdl and do the job.? Hell ... how many young people are out there with no drivers licence or credit card? The more time goes on the more it seems fall into this category.

 

The cell phone is the best business. A person can liquidate literally everything in order to buy drugs or whatever their desire is. Have literally nothing but the clothes on their back, whatever cash in their pocket, no pot to pee in, yet that phone bill gets paid every month.
Amazes me.

Addiction is a ##### though.

 

I went through a mega and it was the best decision I have ever made. Was tired of working fast food dealing with weirdo customers all of the time and couldn't find anything else because I didn't go to college and most good paying jobs are looking for some type of experience with some form of college. Wanted to get into trucking school, but didn't have the cash to pay up front so I went to a mega. Gave me a bus ticket, housed me, taught me, free breakfast every morning, tested out and got my CDL, did my month with a mentor and went solo.

Took about 35 bucks out of my paycheck every week for a year to pay back the schooling, but that was more than fair and for the second year, they pay you 35 bucks a week. Fast forward two years later, have a beautiful house with cars with cash in the bank. Before going to trucking school, I barely had a pot to piss in.

Going to a mega definitely improved my life. If you have an opportunity, TAKE IT AND DO THE BEST YOU CAN!

 

I doubt I have the answer to 1/2 percent of life’s questions — but I do know this: put the effort in to make yourself a RELIABLE hand and you will always be able to put beans on the table; put the effort into making your self a GOOD hand and you get to put a T-bone steak on the platter once in a while; put the effort into making yourself an EXCELLENT hand and you eat prime rib when you want to, biff the prom queen and drive a big long caddie — with horns on the grill. The harder you work and the more you invest in yourself, the luckier you get.

 

Unfortunately for most people who get to this point in their lives, it is all due to making bad decision after bad decisions. That propensity of making bad decisions tends to carry on to trucking.