This will be my best week in trucking so far

Good job driver, sounds like a good gig

 

You are milkin it my man

 

Might want to write that down on a calendar for future reference. If I had a good week, I knew a bad one was a 'comin',,

 

The "not much of a life" part I really hate to hear.

 

It’s amazing how hard you have to work as a trucker to make $1700.

We have to pay $40/hr for mediocrity. My contractor’s go to carpenter/all-purpose guy—Bubba—ran some crown molding that had coped joints with 1/4” wide gaping seams filled with caulk. It looked like crap. No self-respecting carpenter would put his name on that. I sure wouldn’t.

When the contractor was in negotiations with Bubba to become a full time employee, he said he needed $80,000/year take home. $80,000 per year for mediocrity.

Contractor says he quit trying to get “pretty good” out of his subs. It’s been a 30 year long losing battle. Now he just expects mediocrity from most carpenters, if they even show up.

Not answering their phone, not showing up, and disappearing for days and weeks is the norm. We are paying over $7000 to have 900 SF of tile chipped up, three bathrooms gutted, and a little framing done. Two guys could do the work in a week. But we can’t get people to show up.

A man and his son came over from Panama City looking for work. Supposedly hungry and eager to get started. We put him on that $7000 demo job, and after three days of not showing up and making lame excuses, contractor tells him to forget it.

I recently had a cabinet installer turn his nose up at a one day cabinet installation that would pay $1200. “Well, there’s not a lot of money in it for me, but I’ll do you a favor.” My jaw hit the floor! $1200 for a day isn’t good money?!?

This is why I’ve been a one-man show for 25 years, but my shoulders are shot. Now I get to manage these people as a superintendent. Yay!

If only our construction workers had the work ethic of your average truck driver. If only truck drivers made what your average mediocre trim carpenter makes.

Seems backwards.

 

I made 80k my first year on the road. It was hard the first little while adjusting to the lifestyle and the manual labor involved.

But I stuck with it. Now the job feels like easy money. Its just driving around, doing a few pick ups, dropping it off at the end of the week, hauling some food on the weekends. Thats about it. Dont have to really talk to anyone. Just listen to music and drive.