Recognizing Truck Driving as Skilled Occupation


Rasar said:
Something tells me that, in any case, the salary for drivers in the Walmart is not higher than that of other companies.
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You would be very wrong. WalMart drivers start at $72,000 US, not including the extra pays, like being paid for sleeping in the truck, chaining their tires, every single time they back to a dock, time spent delivering if it's more than 45 minutes... Lots of other stuff. It's very easy for them to make over $100K in a year. Plus benefits.
 
Rasar said:
Something tells me that, in any case, the salary for drivers in the Walmart is not higher than that of other companies. If they pay for each hour, so do not give enough miles, and where a lot of miles - do not pay for hours.
Apparently it's a corporate agreement the companies to eliminate competition salaries.
My brother works in the Midland, and they also pay for everything, but still pay the same, because it is not enough miles
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Average national wage for Walmart drivers is 82500 a year.
 
Injun said:
It's very easy for them to make over $100K in a year. Plus benefits.
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It is quite possible. But Wal-Mart is not the carrier company, and I am sure that his workers have their unions that protect their rights. Surely become a driver there is very difficult. Besides, I'm sure that the drivers are working there a lot at night.I have worked in a similar company that transported their goods Klayson group. 5 years ago, the salary was 72000v year. And work only during the day and at home every day.I'm talking about the company's carriers. And they all pay about the same.By the way Israel had a similar situation. I worked at a chemical factory driver, and therefore received more pay and less work
 
I work under a contract carrier for a WalMart DC (Distribution Center). I don't work directly for WalMart. But I'm friends with several of their drivers who work from the same DC. I've seen their pay stubs.

They have a lot of rules to follow, but most of it is common sense stuff, like don't curse at other staff, be on time, wear a uniform and so on. They are not union. The WalMart guys I work with typically start their work days between 6:00 and 8:00 and end their day between 18:00 and 20:00. There is some night driving, but not as much as you might expect. At least, not for the employee drivers where I am. The bulk of the night driving is done by the contract carrier I drive for.

I have been thinking about going to work directly for WalMart as an employee driver myself. If I do, it would not be until next year, after I have title to this truck. I have worked too hard to give up on that now. Even then, I may change my mind. I have a lot of autonomy as a lease or owner operator that I would not have as an employee driver.

I don't know how WalMart has their transportation division set up in Canada, but here in the USA, the drivers are very well taken care of. I would almost call them spoiled.
 
When I started, it was called Transport Driver in Canada and was a "skilled trade". Newbies like me usually started out with a straight truck doing local delivery, then up to daycab and a trailer intercity. Took about 2 years to work your way up to a tandem highway rig. Most places required 2 years experience and the good ones were asking 5.

The Liberal govts turned it into "no-skilled" back in the 80's.... around the same time they started the "multi-cultural" nonsense. By the 90's we were hip deep in non-english speakers (or readers). Trouble was they brought all the old world tribal wars with them. Such got us a planeload of dead Canadians. look up Air India Flight 182 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Long story short, the govt paid "subsidies" to get the companies to hire them and wages went flat. Went downhill from there.
 
krelithous said:
my thoughts are. trucking USED to be a skilled Occupation but not anymore not with the way the industry is going
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Trouble is, you can only "dumb down" things so far.

You can see already the "unforseen consequences" of "modern technology answers". Trucks and loads sitting on the side of the road, usually from some electronic fault. Truck, trailer and load being towed cause you can't fix this crap on the roadside anymore. Couple of weeks ago our outfit has 5 scattered all over the US. Minimum 3 days in the shop cause nobody carries parts and everybody's swamped. All so they can hire folks with minimal training and skills.

Amazingly enough we still manage to winnow out some pretty good drivers who actually care about what they're doing... in spite of the "smart people".
 
rigjockey said:
No they don't. The U.S. Feds recognizes it as semi-skilled. Big difference.
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We will never be considered "skilled labor" by the very definition.

Skilled labor involves at least equal to a 4 year degree for training.


Try following the links. That's why they were put there. Social security and dept of labor both consider drivers semi-skilled by virtue of the requirement for benefits and level of benefits.

Based on that alone, they have to consider us semi skilled which puts a driver on par with most mechanics, equipment operators and even some medical labor positions.
 
Southern Fried said:
The Liberal govts turned it into "no-skilled" back in the 80's.... around the same time they started the "multi-cultural" nonsense. By the 90's we were hip deep in non-english speakers (or readers). Trouble was they brought all the old world tribal wars with them. Such got us a planeload of dead Canadians.
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If you make it difficult to obtain a driver's license, impose new laws and regulations require psychometric tests for drivers, then disappear by themselves are bad drivers.
For many years I was a driving instructor in the Israeli army with the rank of sergeant major. For each form of transport was required to take a course and pass a test.
As a result, among the army vehicles were fewer accidents than among civilians, despite the young age of the drivers.
To obtain a license for this Israeli jeep, you need a couple of hours
learn in the classroom, the exam to pass, and then another two hours of practice on the highway and off-road. I taught them in the classroom and at the off-road . They are the ones who already have a license a year or more.

 
mndriver said:
We will never be considered "skilled labor" by the very definition.

Skilled labor involves at least equal to a 4 year degree for training.


Try following the links. That's why they were put there. Social security and dept of labor both consider drivers semi-skilled by virtue of the requirement for benefits and level of benefits.

Based on that alone, they have to consider us semi skilled which puts a driver on par with most mechanics, equipment operators and even some medical labor positions.
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You ever hear of a thing called called "apprenticeship"? In trucking the apprenticeship was as I described above and why a serious trucking outfit would not hire long-haul with less than 3 years.

The idea that you needed a "degree" to be skilled is a recent phenomenum. Hell, most of the artizans from past years would have laughed in your face for suggesting such a thing.
 
You're shooting the messenger.

The govt defines what is considered unskilled, skilled, semi-skilled etc.

People come here crying that driversare "unskilled" labor and we aren't. The when you show them what they are considered and it's still not good enough.
 
mndriver said:
You're shooting the messenger.

The govt defines what is considered unskilled, skilled, semi-skilled etc.

People come here crying that driversare "unskilled" labor and we aren't. The when you show them what they are considered and it's still not good enough.
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No. I'm not.... at this hour of the AM I can't aim worth nuthin'. Not till the 3rd cuppa coffee anyhow. :D

We're not the only trade with this problem. With all the plant construction, etc going on down here everybody's begging for welders, electricians, etc.

But same problem.... the young have been taught that "trades" are beneath them and those who do take courses at the "community college" come out thinking they're entitled to top wage.

Face it, we've turned back the page to the days when the "elites" happily sat in their castles and we "serfs" were there to serve their every whim.
 
If it's any comfort, we have the same problem in Europe :( The common opinion is, if you're not smart enough for anything else, you can always become a truckdriver ! pfffffffffft.....!!

In my case, I have 10 years of public school, I'm a skilled Mechanic (3,5 years education) continued working as a Mechanic 3,5 years after I finished my education. Then I worked as an Exhibition contractor for another 3years, moved to England when I was 26 started my own Exhibition contracting business, that didn't end too well though LOL after 2 years I had 2 clients going bust on me, within 3 weeks... so I went bust as well, moved back to Denmark and I got a Job as an Exhibition Coordinator, at the worlds largest Pump manufacturing company.

Anyway, Truckdriving was something I always wanted, so when I was 30 I took the plunge ;) I haven't regretted it for a second :) But all this leads me to the conclusion, all my skills, mechanics, travelling a lot, I speak 4 languages more or less fluently, my sence of who I'm dealing with, wheter it's the guy on the floor or a snobby manager, making fast calculations on space and weight distribution etc.. all this I regard as major advantages for our trade, driving the truck is the easy part!

Here in Denmark, we now have a 3years education for becoming a Truckdriver, so the young people coming into the trade, are quite well "dressed" for the job, I have hopes for them, to turn this sad/wrong view of our profession.
I believe, that one of the reasons that "we - the old buggers" lost the battle, because we forgot to take ourselves seriously, we might have focussed too much on the fun and games part of our lifestyle. And whenever a new law was forced upon us, the first thing we did, was finding a way around it, instead of looking at why did this law come out of the blue..? Am I wrong ?
 
You're right. We are working as draft horses, without the normal trade unions, which can protect our interests. We are afraid to go on strike, because we are on a short leash because of low salaries. And we can not let us lose workdays. If I had good English, I would organize a strike
 

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