"Sweatshops on Wheels"

I agree that it's a thick read and--in places--boring. I won't be a spoiler and give his conclusions away. The book helped me to understand regulation and deregulation of the industry and--my main interest--federal HOS and its role in the mess; I hated the HOS but was willing to use it to turn down egg-suck loads; easier to do before computers came into the cab.

Before 1935, anyone could buy a truck and get into the business. Most people failed because they often set their rates too low to make any money, just to beat out their competitors. Competition between carriers was said to be "cut-throat." There were hundreds of thousands of repossessed truck sitting around. The government stepped in and regulated rates (a trucking company could set rates, but the Interstate Commerce Commission had to approve; they almost often did). It's interesting that the ATA (formed in 1932) opposed regulation, but, in the midst of the Great Depression and with an industry that was on the ropes, had little choice. So rates and driver pay were stabilized (as always, union employees made more than non-union employees; the ICC didn't interfere with driver pay; that was a "labor" issue. You had to appeal to the ICC for a rate increase. Entry into the industry could be opposed by a competitor, then you couldn't get in). Okay, even as early as Harry Truman, presidents spoke about how artificially high freight rates weren't good for the overall economy. Every president after that--Eisenhower through Clinton--talked about deregulation. In 1980, economic and regulatory deregulation became the law (other countries in Europe and even South America have gone through their periods of government regulation and deregulation of their transportation industries; Canada too). So, 1980: instead of federal control of rates and routes, overnight you had a market-driven industry. Competition. Cut-throat competition was back. Rates plummeted and so did driver pay; driving a truck was no longer a solid middle-class occupation. Welcome to what Belzer called the race to the bottom. By 1981 the ATA was screaming about a "driver shortage." They said that 18-year olds should be allowed to drive (it was the ICC that established the minimum interstate driving age as 18); nothing new there. So that's part of how we got where we are: the fat of trucking rates and driver pay that could float up with every ICC approval for increased rates were gone. Lower shipping rates were said to be good for the economy. They fueled the economic expansion of the 1980s and 1990s, but, as Jim Johnston has said, it was done on our backs. With deregulation, shippers and receivers won. Truck drivers lost. Simple as that.

All of this is set against the background of the federal HOS, which hit the road in 1939; some states had their own as far back as 1923. The ICC based its trucking HOS on its railroad HOS, which date to the early 1900s. Between 1935 and 1939, the ICC held public listening sessions across the country. Drivers and owners and unions gave input. Work and driving (combined) were set at 10 hours maximum per day. Drivers had to be allowed 8 hours minimum off duty per day. I'm not sure when the 15-hour work maximum was established. In 1962 a 10-hour day became: you could drive 10, take 8 off then drive 10 again, up until you hit 60 hours in 7 days (if your company was closed one day a week) or 70 hours in 8 days if your carrier ran all the time. Or you pulled out another log book. I never thought of it as "cheating." Rules that told me when to sleep cheated me. I forgot to mention that log books were introduced in 1939. Though the 10/8/15 HOS sucked in many ways, there was flexibility, and we could fudge our books so that we slept when we were tired, not when a regulator said we were supposed to be tired. Going on to another book is what Belzer called "sweating yourself," in parallel with the sweatshop concept and piece-work--you're paid by the piece (mile, load, ton, whatever). The only way to make more money when you're paid by the piece is make more pieces.

So, yeah, I liked Belzer's book.

 

It was 10/8/16 per day. The 8 could be broken up as much as you wanted, as long as you had 8 hours off/ sleeper per day. Yea, it was easy to cheat. Even easyer if you used 2 books. I am glad that 2 books is no longer typical. I could not do it anymore. I do wish we could break up the 10 some and stop the 14 without having to take minimum 8 hours to do it. The 14 is the worst so called safety rule to ever come down the pike.
Hourly pay would be great for many forms of transportation, but it will never be the norm, since no matter how many hard working drivers are out there you will always have the lazy ones that just will not work.

They can say that the low freight rates help the economy. But how much? When you break down the per mile rate over a whole load it is really almost no cost at all. If you raise it by 1.00 per mile it still is not that high.
People like to bring up 5 dollar per gallon milk.
A gallon of milk weighs 8.6 lbs. For ease of use lets say 9 lbs. This will cover pallets etc on a load. So that is 4554 gallons of milk in a 41k lb load. Which is about normal on a reefer.
So lets say we are pulling a load on a lane that pays 2.00 per mile now. It is a 1000 mile load. Cost currently would be 2000 dollars for that load. Or right around .44 cents per unit.
Raise that rate by 1.00 per mile it will cost .66 cents per unit. An increase of 22 cents. Hardly enough to raise the cost per gallon 1.00 or more.

Granted, all these numbers are estimates for easy math purposes. But when you are talking about peoples overall bill for items purchased in a month it would not raise their costs more than 50 dollars per month overall. And it would help every trucking company, every driver, and everywhere all the millions of us connected to the transportation industry have more money to spend.
Also, a 1.00 per mile boost is a huge one. But the 20 cpm that drivers actually need would not be.

 

That's always a huge misnomer, pure economies of scale do not make prices rise out of control by raising prices and paying employees better.

 

THANKS AC that is some good history/info and spot on.

I was told about the book "Sailor on a Concrete Sea" (2006) ISBN 0870136860 and would like to add that the list of 'READ BEFORE' signing up at the local "Truck driving school"

 

I've been wanting to read that Sweatshops On Wheels book, but everytime I've seen it available, they wanted a ####### arm and a leg for it!
I just looked on Amazon, and saw them for $58, $85, and and $95... I wanna read this book, but I don't want to get ####### milked in order to be able to read it.

 

We Have Bigger Problems Dude I f they can Search you like a Criminal @ The Airport or Question your Citizenship in your own country
[h=2]"Sweatshops on Wheels"is the least of my Concern's[/h]

 

Don't spend that much. You'll be sorry you did.

 

I have to agree that $58 or $95 is way too much. No idea why booksellers are asking for big bucks. If I had an extra copy I'd pass it around to anyone who wants to read it. I've had mine for years. Can't recall what it cost me, but it sure wasn't $58! Local libraries might have it or can get it.

 

Anyone that wants to read the intro and some parts of the book, Sweatshop on Wheels, can read it here on Google Books.

Also here is Trucking Country by Shane Hamilton.

From what I could read, they both seem like good books, especially Sweatshop. He explains briefly in the introduction how the cutthroat competition ends up hurting the person doing the work as they try to work harder and harder to produce more for the same amount of money. It's not the owners, shippers, receivers, truck makers, fuel dealers, truckstop owners, parts companies, or any other companies getting hurt - it is the people doing the work, just like it was a couple hundred years ago.

Whenever there is a surplus of labor chasing a shortage of work, and there are no minimums required (such as a minimum wage), then the people doing the work are left competing against themselves in the "race to the bottom" as we are in now. And we are letting it happen, in the false belief that deregulation is good for us, while minimum wages and maximium hours are bad for you because they limit the amount you earn (translation: they are bad for the owner, because they limit how much the owner can screw you).

 

You can read mine for round trip shipping but the insurance on that $95 book would kill you LOL.