Farmers may need CDLs

The testers have to grow their own corn fields for the "field test". Or the farmer next to the testing facility gets pissed off all the time. What are you cutting my corn down for? Get out of my field!

Crops don't wait on anyone. When it's time, the job has to be done.

It's funny the gov't thinks they need to control anything commercial, yet they turn their head to all these crazy 4wheelers breaking the laws everyday.

 

Agreed CC. They dispense licenses like toilet paper, and are fairly lax in removing them except for reaally bad stuff.

EX: You get a DUI and a year later reinstated with special insurance and probation right. Kill someone and that now becomes serious we lock you up for a decade and suspend for life.

My question is why the difference. The decisions made in each case was identical. The driver drove drunk. The facct that people managed to avoid the driver should not in my opinion mitigate the suspension. Now I get the difference in jail time but the license privilege should be far easier to lose and far harder to gain.

 

It is the catering to the mob (or masses) that drives this government. Government programs like Social Security, whatever they call disability now, welfare, road projects, military bases, food stamps....all projects to sway the masses(Yes that is why we were never a democracy). But in the end they have to be elected. So right wrong or indifferent we all of us are the #### problem. Well unless you can get OOIDA to hire you then you can sit your politician butt in Washington even when you were fired by your constituents. But I digress.



So not one reason to not make them follow the same laws as everyone else running similar equipment? Shock. Well ok price points, but those are bogus. You choose too buy the product or not that will regulate price.

You know diesel prices affect price significantly. Maybe they should make it where that doesn't effect you price. Oh wait you want protections to keep your price low.

Alright every slaughter plant in America has a duplicate staff. One from the USDA, and one from the company. Imagine how much we could save you by eliminating one of them.Which one would you suggest. Choose wisely.





And yes I do get harsh when people start to label me, or as you have flat out lied about my views. It's a reflex like hitting my knee. So like I suggested quit pigeon holing people.



Oh I forgot your done. Well never mind but chew on this thought when calling someone a socialist. I would fully support an immediate conversion to privitization of all interstate highways so long as the tax burden(fuel,HUT,etc etc) we pay now is lifted. Private corporations should collect the fees for the use of these (and here come a really ugly word so prepare for an anurism) toll roads to maintain and yes turn a profit on these roads. Private industry would not spend money paid for the road on a park, they would ensure that any work was best priced and quickly done, and it would remove the biggest stick the Federal Government has over State Governments.


To simple of a plan from a(What am I?Oh yes I recall) a socialist libertarian.People crack me up.

 

When I got my cdl, it took four trips to town. First trip I got my medical card, weeks later I took the computer test, you have to pass this then schedule your driving test. Third trip was to take the driving test, after passing this I had to wait for the tester to enter the info, which wouldn't be until after business hours that night. Then I had to go to town the fourth time to actually get my license. In hind sight I may have been able to schedule my medical card physical and my computer test for the same day, but it didn't work our for me that way. I lived 85 miles from town so you can see it was quite a burden just to get my license. I work for myself so I don't get paid for these trips to town.

 

Nothing is holding me back from getting my CDL, I've been thinking about it for some time. In fact the book is laying here on the desk right next to me. Been tossing the idea of going to work in the oil field this winter driving semi since I'm in the Minot area and oil isn't too far away.

There is some farmers out there who don't have time to worry about getting a CDL. They farm and ranch every day of their lives. And heck around here you have to wait about a month to even think of being able to schedule a road test because of all the oil field getting CDLs. They are booked solid. Do you think a farmer knows where he will be in a month? No, getting the crop harvested or winter wheat planted is more important than a CDL road test.

I'm not saying needing a CDL for a farmer to drive a semi for personal use isn't fair, do I agree with it...certain parts, but to drive a tractor or something similar down the road is a little crazy I think.

And as far as them regulating the hours we'd be able to drive with our CDL well thats when the farmers have issues. When you need to run 16hr days and sometimes more for weeks straight to get the crop off we can't be having to sit because we ran "out of hours". 1 rain or storm could be a big difference in the crop and that means money.

Do we pay for on-road diesel in our semi? Yes we do. Do we complain about it? No Do I think farmers should be exempt from everything? No, but during harvest we NEED to get the crop off.

Next time people complain about farmers being exempt from this and exempt from that and blah blah blah, remember who planted, sprayed, and harvested that food on your plate, a farmer did.

I'm not trying to bash the truck drivers on here, because I know the saying "if you bought it, a truck brought it". I respect truck drivers, because in a way I am one. It's more towards the general public.

 

I'm not anti-farmer and dont advocate them getting CDL's however i dont think they should be given a blind eye when it comes to licensing and regulations/inspections. I'm not a big fan of farmer joe doing his 10 mph on a 2 lane pulling combo hay wagons with no lights whatso ever with his stuff dog tracking so bad his wagons are in the oncoming lane.

 

Hell, that's the same description of half of the rail trailers I see on the road.....

 

Yea, i dont doubt that!

 

I think all farmers operating a vehicle over 46,000lbs should have CDL's and license there trucks commercially. Around here most of the big farmers are all pulling doubles with brand new trucks. But farmers don't need commercial plates if there hauling there own grain, well lots of them haul for there neighbors or there buddys or even for the local grain elevator but if they get stopped they just tell the cop there hauling there own grain and the cop has no way to prove them wrong. It's total ########, farmplates for an 86,000lb vehicle cost $400 here but yet to license my truck commercially for the same weight it costs me around $2000 with heavy use tax included (farmers dont pay heavy use tax). Another thing that pisses me off is that when I load out of an elevator or off a farm I'm always legal, yet most of the farmers around here just fill the trailer up til it's running over all four corners and go.................there the ones busting the roads all up not me. I mean I need to keep a logbook, I need a DOT physical, I need a CDL, I pay heavy use tax but farmers dont. If your operating a vehicle for commercial use you need a CDL and commercial plates, well what's so different about farming??? Isn't that a business???? Sorry for the rant but this subject really strikes a nerve for me, the government always feels sorry for the farmer but I dont. You show me a poor farmer and I'll show you one that's not smart enough to milk the system.

 

Farmers aren't exempt from heavy use tax. There is a mileage exemption for running under 5000 miles per year or 7500 miles in agriculture. You could get out of heavy use tax if you're running less than 7500 miles per year yourself. Farmers are also subject to weight limits. There is often some allowance within so many miles of an elevator or scale, but this allowance can be had for commercial haulers as well in the same circumstance. See my post above for what will happen if everybody is forced to meet the same requirements as commercial haulers. What will you haul? Less regulation is always the correct answer, not more regulation.