Mar 2, 2008 -
Bad days for truckers
Is a truck stop parking lot full of independently owned rigs soon to be a thing of the past?
This article was noted in the forums yesterday... Independent truckers see end of the road
Owner/Operators are definitely getting beat up by fuel prices, and they have no relief in sight. On Feb 12 (as I noted a few blog posts down), I paid $3.239 for diesel at the Sunoco station I've been using since 1996. This past Friday, the same station was at $3.599 - a 36 cent increase in 2 weeks.
The O/Os quoted in the article have a point. Trucks are still the primary mode of direct cargo delivery in the United States - a CSX locomotive doesn't pull up to your home with an overnight package or to the supermarket with that week's shelf stock. Boeing 747s can't bring things like steel girders to a highway bridge construction site. And if the economy and fuel prices force the independent truckers completely out of the picture, we will indeed be left with higher prices for everything if only a handful of large fleets remain... and that won't exactly be their fault, either.
Is the answer a tax break, a nationally-backed discount fuel card, periodic rebate checks, or some form of subsidy (as the article mentions were given to the independent farmers)? I don't know, and I don't want to guess what would help O/Os the most right now, besides the obvious. The quote from the repossession company was probably the most telling, and it almost seems to mimic what's happening with the mortgage mess... And it's taking less time to pick up a truck, which he sees as a sign that there's less work to keep them on the road — and out of his reposessors' reach. "It used to take weeks, now it takes days or hours,"
Wasn't all that long ago that O/Os could make a fairly good living. If you were willing to work hard and often, there was a financial gain. Your tractor could be upgraded into a showplace on the outside and a studio apartment on the inside, complete with toilet. There was a Harley-like attitude of being out on the open road with no one to answer to but yourself. Today, O/Os have to answer to the bank that financed that rig, and if they can't make enough money to cover the operational costs, they park the truck - then the repo man starts his rounds.
My friend Vikki is a fleet driver. That red Pete is her assigned rig and it's essentially her home away from home, but she is absolved of the headaches and heartaches of ownership. The home office worries about truck costs and insurance. A company credit card fills the tanks... she only has to handle personal costs like food, laundry, etc., and keeping her logbook up to snuff. A company dispatcher tells her where to go for the next load. In that regard, she's lucky.
The owner/operators she shares the interstates with aren't as lucky.
Now that I think about it, B. J. McKay is likely in another line of work today.
