What's good hourly pay for company drivers now

When growing up in my home town some the best diesel mechanics I know never went to a school yet all these shops go one place when they hit troubleshooting issue and its all to the guy with the most experience and never stepped foot into school since high school. they work on oil field equipment mostly as of late but it's pretty bad when the so-called educated people have come to visit them to fix an issue.

Trade skills can completely be taught without a normal education welding, electricians, plumbers, mechanics, truck drivers. makes no difference. You can go college for any these skill trades, or you have buddy, relative show you mentor you through the process.

 

$30 isn't what the market can handle. those companies that offer that are closed shops, and the capacity is managed in a way that maximum efficiency is the goal through the entire supply chain within the company.

ON the other hand ... no matter how good YOU think YOU are, most of the time your hourly rate is worth far less, maybe $20 at best because you are a commodity in this industry, nothing more than a replaceable item like a light bulb.

Drivers have done this to themselves, they are not trying to change anything to force the industry to change anything, they like it like it is other than the money they get while they don't see what the problems are with this attitude.

 

I have found that hourly pay for nearly any trade is directly tied to the cost of living in that area.
Your local job there at 19.75 would pay you 30 bucks here, but at the end of the week, you would have the same nickel in your pocket,

 

I agree with alot this especially the drivers done this to self the only two solutions I see going forward government intervenes. And if that does happen it may not be for the best we all know how well them upping the regulation does to the driver. Take the Arkansas case with Pam I know companies ain't gonna want to pay us both CPM and hourly. I see them doing a low flat rate in future of hourly if this ever comes to a head in the sense required for all states. The other even harder to accomplish is a nationwide union which as we all know the good pay would only be seen by the executives.

The biggest problem in the industry is an abundance of drivers. the real problem lies in how many getting there CDL daily and the current drivers increase while some drop out the industry for a bit or sometimes forever. The ones only drop for a bit still have CDL could be waiting for a better opportunity. While same time some carriers have a hard time filling seats sometimes I have seen a mega carrier with trucks just parked for a long period of time waiting for a driver.

So it's a bit of both of no driver shortage and a driver shortage. Companies expect the will lose drivers and I am sure they have previous years numbers for a baseline and know how to still stay above water just fine.

 

Just because the loads are valuable. Doesn't mean the rates to haul such high value are there. To pay the wages.

 

And the company I'm working for is paying $35 an hour in compensation. That does include insurance, vacations, sick, etc yes. The number one guy have been there 35 years, The number 10 guy 19 years. To say $20 is the max is just wrong and trying to convince others to not pay the drivers the maximum they can get.
The company has been around decades, and as one of the top 500 companies in America to work for (as per a recent posting here anyway) I doubt they will be going away any time soon.

 

You are doing specialized freight and honestly it seems you are making a bit over $31/hour. You have no reason to think this is the market I am talking about.

I have trucks hauling million dollar cargo on a daily basis, but this is in a very small segment of the industry. It seems more of the stuff that is hauled in the industry is common dry van etc. ... - doesn't require the special precautions for those HV loads, and it does require a driver that is more than just a steering wheel holder.

The majority of drivers are making close to $15/hour, this is the market wage for OTR, not specialised freight.

Somewhat disagree. the market - as I stated being the majority of the industry - won't support the wage.

Getting rid of the companies that you mentioned are not going to do anything, they will create a vacuum if anything, there will be a bunch of marginal operators who will end up fighting (through rate decreases) and drive rates done.

Yeah here there are $40 and $50 non union jobs around here but those jobs are demanding more than just a driving skill.

Yep I view this as skilled trades, I wish all of you see the same thing, but most see it just as a job.

 

Yeah Zvar, I know a bunch companies up there that never would pay more than $20 and their turn over is high.

Most of the companies around Detroit have a $25/hour rate, but then they also treat this as a job with high turn over.

 

You probably aren’t doing bad for your area just for the health care alone. 55 hours per week isn’t that much really but your still pulling in 65k and health insurance if you paid it yourself would probably be $1000/mo. Not to mention 401k. If you want more then move towards a city.