What happened to wages in the industry?

Lots of families suck. Money well made for some

 

What was the “average” driver like in 1980? Could the average driver change a flat on a semi? Was the average driver expected to be able to adjust the brakes? Drive 1000 miles a day? Wear a uniform? Be able to fingerprint a load? Operate a truck with 2 sticks and Armstrong steering? Navigate without a GPS? Throw hands?
Compare the average in 1980 vs today across the board completely. See the difference?

 

Like has been said umpteen times before, there are great paying trucking jobs out there. Someone's failure to find one does not mean the sky has fallen on the industry.

 

I realize how insignificant I am after reading this post. Alls I wanted was a little more money

 

####... Sounds like truckers back then were the cowboys of the road.

 

The only power the driver has to boost wages is NEVER EVER UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCE work for low paying companies. The industry saw they could hire low-qualified new drivers willing to work for less money, drive easier trucks, get less time off, so that's who was hired. Then Obama and Biden opened the border and allowed anyone tired of living in squalor anywhere to move to the US and flood the trucking industry, among others, and that depressed wages or kept them from rising as much as a "driver shortage" would have boosted them.

ANYONE telling you they will fix the problems with capitalism is going to do nothing but make more people poorer. Imagine a doctor saying he will cure infections by ADDING bacteria to your blood. Capitalism produces the most jobs for the most people. Even the communist Chinese agree with this. EVERY alternative produces less jobs and lower pay. So "fixing" capitalism means picking which people get more and which people get less and creates a govt army of "fixers" who suck resources and produce worse results for the economy. No mix of capitalism and socialism CAN produce better results anymore than more infection added to a healthy body can help the healthy more than just having the healthy body. The people pushing for fixes are only creating power for themselves or an army of "fixers" that waste resources on harmful programs. The magic fix doesn't exist and we have 100+ years of data and dead bodies which confirm what I described above. This time is NOT different, and the better form of socialism/communism doesn't exist and cannot come into existence, no matter who is claiming they have found the magic formula. They are lying and they know they are lying. You should know they are lying also.

 

it went to sh** long before Biden and Obama

 

The flood of foreign drivers is what changed under Obama & Biden.

 

No clue where they got their numbers from, but when I started driving in 1984, I was making 9 cents a mile with another 3 for safety bonus and $20 a drop (OTR). Boiled down, I was making about 15K a year. My dad was a city driving teamster in 1980 (died in 82) and he made about 25k a year. (edit: 35k a year - but that was pretty much top money, not the "average")

Granted, I was a rookie right out of (a 7 month) trucking school (where we had to change tires, back through a rodeo course, parallel park, ect), and you needed 2 years experience to get a "good" job that payed around 13 cents a mile. Overland Express (which became Transport America) hired me with a year and a half experience in 86 at .13 a mile plus perks... Was up to about 18k there.