America has a truck driver shortage
At a rough point in my life, I was a truck driver for CR England and Knight Transportation for a few days short of 7 months.<p>You don’t start at 80,000 a year. That’s such a lie. You make about 600 a week to start, roughly, depending if you get enough miles. You don’t get the good routes, staying in well populated areas like the i5 corridor, at first. You stay in the middle of no where Arizona, North Dakota, etc.<p>You spend a lot on food because you can’t buy bulk that easily like you would for an apartment. Want a hot meal? You have to eat at fast food restaurants or truck stops.<p>How’s your back? 7 months I went from never understanding back pain to 6 years later I still suffer from the back pain.<p>Family life? HA! How does that work when you VISIT home for 3 days out of a month and you get calls CONSTANTLY that you have to get back to the truck. It’s not likely the military where you are doing something decently important. You are wasting your life to ship clothes for the Gap or frozen pizzas.<p>You are constantly sleep deprived. Constantly sitting. The companies hound you constantly about speeding up and trying to break the law to get loads faster to their destination because they screwed up the logistics and didn’t do some simple math. Yes, they publicly say they don’t tell drivers to break the law. Bullshit. CR England is the worst about this. Knight wasn’t so bad.<p>Fuck driving jersey in a truck.<p>The industry needs MASSIVE reformation. Then, some of the arguements here by folks who never did it can be remotely valid. You ruin your personal life and your body for realistic 300 a week after you figure all the costs for not ever being home.