I did OTR for over 3 years pulling van/reefer and at the end of the day, I found that I just wasn't getting paid what I was worth. Figure I was averaging around $1,000 per week on the gross which was pretty good. But at an average of 90 hours per week on the job, it worked out to about 11 bucks an hour with no overtime. I found that I could make just as good money driving a forklift around in a warehouse and sleep in my own bed everynight. Luckily, I was able to land a good-paying LTL gig.

Now, someone's gonna pipe in and say they don't work those kinds of hours driving the big truck and I'll be the first to call them a bona-fide LIAR. When you factor in all the time waiting on loads and waiting to be loaded/unloaded at shippers/receivers, you'll see that you're constantly putting in 12-14 hour days. And that's the facts, Jack.

Most of the new guys at these big training companies like Swift, Werner, England, Schneider, etc are only grossing in the neighborhood of $600 - $800/week. Do the math and that's like 7-10 bucks an hour to live in a truck away from your friends/family for weeks on end.

Maybe some people think that's good money for the job. Oh well. Takes all kinds to make this big world go around, I suppose. And if that's what floats your boat then by all means, keep on truckin'. I got no beef with ya'. Just don't hold me up in the hammerlane when I'm on my way HOME everynight making $31.50/hr on overtime pay!!

 

You Stick it Useless
just joking(I think) :P

OK-I'll chime in on this. First of all it sounds like a Union Theme song.
Facts are wrong on a few fronts. I started in '78 and the article said something like 9 out of 10 OTR drivers were union-bs"Before 1980, nearly 9 out of 10 over-the-road drivers were union members"

Second of all-With the old HOS we were LEGALLY allowed to run appx. 16 hrs in a 24 hour day but most of us ran Much more than that because the Feds treated us like Professionals back then and DOT didn't mess with us unless somebody was totally out of Whack.
Most guys ran 800+ miles a day and accidents weren't all that prevalent and 4 wheelers treated us like the knights of the road MOST of us were.

Deregulation came in and everybodies brother and sister got into trucking=rates went Down and it became a cut-throat business. Outlaw trucking outfits started this whole mess-Trucking companies became Mega-companies in order to compete and seats needed to be filled and training lacked causing accidents.

I HATE Federal Regulations but the solution is Mandating Certified training and a certain time behind the wheel with a QUALIFIED and Federally Certified Trainer for a specified period of Time.

That's my spin on this mess.
Peace out

 

Do you work in LTL and go home everynight? I havent been able to figure that one out yet lol. J/K with you dont get mad.

 

You said a mouth full, I'm with you!

 

If I sit at a shipper or receiver for more than an hour (and it rarely happens, maybe once every two months or so) I'm in the bunk reading or watching tv or playing around on my laptop. I'm in no way working. so I don't count it as such. BTW I would love to find a job driving a forklift for $1000/wk. Unfortunately they don't exist.

 

Karnajj, I have always told drivers you cant count the sleep time, or sleeping while waiting to load or unload and most don't get it. No one pays a local driver to play his x box when he gets home, or sitting watching the TUBE so my time spent not working is the same as the local driver...lol

 

Of course nobody's gonna pay me because I'm AT HOME and not chained to a truck on private property waiting to get loaded/unloaded. Let me ask you this: can you legally get out of the sleeper berth without going to Line 4, ON-DUTY, NOT DRIVING? The answer to that question is no because it is ILLEGAL to log Line 1 OFF-DUTY at a shipper/receiver unless you get a signed waiver from the customer. And even if you could, where are you gonna go? Take a walk around a fenced-in yard? I can hop in my car and go wherever I want. Here's another question: are you 100% responsible for the truck, trailer, and load you're under. The answer is yes.

That's what you guys don't understand and why you'll always get ripped off. You wait around docks for free, fuel your employer's trucks for free, check-in/check-out of customers for free, wait for the Qualcomm to BEEP! with a load for free, paperwork for free, PM's for free, scale loads for free, PTI's (if you even bother to do them) for free, drop/hook/inspect trailers for free, sweep trailers for free, sit in traffic jams for nothing...the list goes on and on. And then you bury it all in the logbook and claim to ONLY work 70 hours.

Yeah. Sure.

No they don't exist. But there are jobs that pay around $15.00/hr with overtime after 40. Which is something you'll never see in OTR.

 

I guess I am a law breaker because i log line 1 off duty at my customers quite frequently and i can say that a good percent of the time I am not locked in a fenced in property with no where to go. i have been to a few places where the customer straight up told me it would be a bit before they got me done and recomended places close by for me to go chill at and eat and things of that nature. Dont confuse this with me arguing with you though, because i do agree that a GOOD LTL job is a lot more attractive in all aspects but unfortuneately for a lot of us in small towns there are not many jobs like that close by that are practical to go back and forth to. But back to the line 1 thing, I have never been called out on logging that at a customer one single time by my company, customer or anyone else. Yes LTL is great but i also do have to say that driving OTR is not the complete prison that you make it out to be. Your truck is only a prison if you let it be. I try to make the most of my time away from home and not hate my life and make some decent money in the process.
Is OTR what I had planned on doing with my life? No. But Its where I am at at this point and it is supporting my family very well and its not my master or my prsion because I dont let it be. I worked for a Wal-Mart D.C for 3 years and was home everyday with ok money but i felt more like a company sucker there then i do now. Its just simply not as bad as some make it out to be if you make it work for you. Dont work for OTR make OTR work for you. Sorry about the rant. Thats my 2 cents, thanks for reading.

 

Apples to oranges. Between all the time you spend on lines 3 & 4 and in the sleeper at shippers and recivers to protect the "money line" you are easily working 70-80 hrs a week. Here on my piece of the left coast most anyone can get a warehouse job @12-14 hr. If you worked 1 3/4 normal 40hr weeks you would make $840-980 week sleeping in your own bed every night.

Sadly as long as there are fool O/Os like the guy profiled in this article who will haul at their Short Run Marginal Cost (Fuel & tolls) and effectively work for free while slowly liquidating the truck its not going to get much better.

This guy is making many of the common mistakes. He bought waaaay more truck than he can afford. Then he reaches for the fools gold of loads into the black-hole of freight that is Florida while failing to account for the deadhead or cheap load out.

This guy should could and should be earning $50-65k as a company driver at a good OTR like Crete, Gordon etc.

The middle third of the article is cribbed straight from "Sweatshops on Wheels". Its an interesting read, but Belzer has a strong bias towards unions and nostalgia for the regulated transportation sector of a generation ago. I would give you better odds on turning getting a sleigh ride from Satan than Trucking or Aviation pricing being re-regulated.

 

You might have entry level warehouse jobs out there that start at 12-14 dollars but that is because of your ridiculous cost of living. Here in the midwest, thanks to the wetbacks we now have, you'll be lucky to start at $8-$9/hr.
As to your other erroneous assertion, I only log 15 min for loading or unloading (or for a d&h which is what we do %90 of the time0. And who is to say that every minute you have logged in the berth was actually spent in the berth? Even when I am in the berth at a shipper etc. I'm rarely sleeping. Usually I'm watching tv or some such. In no way would I ever consider that to be "working". Maybe its because I have been fortunate enough to have never had a union job and therefore never picked up the lazy attitude that most union workers have.