DRIVER WAGES BACK IN THE DAY

Before deregulation freight paid a lot more to ship. You couldn't just open a trucking business. You had to prove a need for shipping between City A and City B, and wait for approval from the Interstate Commerce Commision before you could haul that freight. Driver pay was much better because the customers were getting screwed royally to move freight. They had little choice of which trucking company to use. Deregulation was meant to give customers choice about which company and how much they wanted to pay. It worked, just like airline deregulation broke open the airline industry and made it possible to pay $189 to fly from NYC to LA.

 

Driver' pay was much better? Yes!
The customer was getting screwed? No!!
Everybody' pay was better, hell back then a person could live on a 40 hour minimum wage job.

 

I couldn't live on minimum wage back then. Maybe on the east cost where living seems to be much cheaper then the west coast.

 

How old are you?

 

At Matlack in 1996, I was getting 29 cpm for chem tanker, which was pretty competitive.

About a year later, IIRC, it was JB Hunt was advertising 50 cpm. I think there were lots of conditions on it. Same with Heartland Express, who advertised something like "up to 55 cpm"

Maybe someone with a better memory can confirm or deny.

I stayed at 29 cpm with Matlack 'til 1998. CPM didn't change, but our accessorials went up a little, and that was our true moneymaker anyway.

 

It's even worse if you look at the standard of measurement.
In December 1971, the "Smithsonian Agreement" was reached. In this agreement, the dollar was devalued from $35 per troy ounce of gold to $38. Other countries' currencies appreciated. However, gold convertibility did not resume. In October 1973, the price was raised to $42.22. Once again, the devaluation was insufficient. Within two weeks of the second devaluation the dollar was left to float. The $42.22 par value was made official in September 1973, long after it had been abandoned in practice. In October 1976, the government officially changed the definition of the dollar; references to gold were removed from statutes. From this point, the international monetary system was made of pure fiat money.
Today, the Gold Price per Ounce has increased 3328% to $1200.50.
At $5.00 an hour multiplied by 60 hours per week in 1971, that's about $350.00 per week or 10 ounces of gold per week.
Since the dollar has lost 98% of its value, we would need to earn about
$12,000.00 per week to buy the same amount of gold today.

 

Is your name Patches?