Apparently, America has a shortage of truck drivers. To such a degree that at least for private fleets, the average trucker salaryis $73,000. I’m not going to specify what exactly I make a year, but it’s not $73,000, and I have to imagine driving long distances is vastly less prone to dealing with office bullshit than my job is.
The amazing thing is the allegation that the reasoning for such a shortage is simply the fact that there aren’t enough people qualified to be truck drivers actually applying for these jobs. I’m not going to assume it’s as simple as driving a Honda Civic for 12 hours straight, because I know that at least there’s the double clutch to consider and the sheer knowledge of physics that comes into play when traversing varying elevations. But it still boils down to the fact that when all the training and preparation is done, it’s basically sitting in a gigantic car, driving things from point A to point B.
Just how much qualifications are required to be truck drivers? They certainly can’t be that much, if the people driving all these trucks are the same people I see getting lost on the country backroads in the areas surrounding my home, or the litany of dumbasses who are crashing their cargo of food stuffs all over Metro Atlanta highways.
Seriously, $73,000 is some pretty decent scratch, for getting to drive around all day and night. Sure, the hours can be long, it might suck to be away from home for long stretches of time, and there’s always anxiety and rage whenever it comes to stupid traffic, but at least the compensation is more fairly respectable.
I wish I could be a truck driver for like a year. I don’t know what the qualifications are, but I’m decently educated, have a clean driving record, and have the stamina to drive long distances. I’d pocket $73,000, and I would use all that time sitting in my big rig to try and do something like Rosetta Stone teach myself some new languages, or be read a litany of audio books. All while driving through the highways of America, seeing some sights, eating some new foods, and not worrying about shit like meetings, work emails and people who think they can do my job better than I can. A year gives me enough time to see what it’s like, try and enlighten myself in the process, and not feel like I’m away from home that much.
