What is the Sentiment Regarding Gas Prices for Truck Drivers?

[stepnw1f]

are they in general getting mad at Bush or what?

[magellan]

1. Oh yeah

One pulled up next to me at a light a few weeks ago -- stopped his truck short so he could shout down to me, "Love your stickers!!" Man, he was on fire. The cost of fuel was killing him. He can't be the only one.

[stepnw1f]

3. I Hear Quite a Few Drivers Call into AAR

That's why I was wondering...

[RufusEarl]

6. Don't have any details,

but i have heard that truck drivers were receiving kick backs, to help cover fuel cost. If anyone has anything in writing on this, maybe they would post it?

[stepnw1f]

10. Inetersting.... I'll Look Out for That (nt)

[Bandit]

15. I have a company that has four delivery drivers and no we don't

get any kick backs. I don't know about the independent trucker that travels interstate though. Not only that but I am charged a surcharge on all my inventory that is freighted in. Needless to say my prices have gone up.

[Horse with no Name]

20. I know several truckers

and they receive nothing. The price is killing them just like it is the rest of us.
Sounds to me like a RW talking point in infancy form.

[Bridget Burke]

23. Who told you about the kickbacks?

Perhaps they can find you something in writing.

[texastoast]

2. They are just passing the cost to the consumer

It's irrelevant to them. Now my 99 cent loaf of bread of last year is costing $1.19.

[magellan]

7. Then why did one bother to stop and exchange fury with me on the road?

It might be more irrelevant for the fleets, but there are truckers who own their own rigs who've got to be hurting every time they fill up.

[texastoast]

19. I don't know

I have a close associate who owns his own truck and he passes the fuel charge to the customer. I don't see how anyone can stay in business if that cost is absorbed. I can certainly understand the fury of it all. Most truckers are even madder about NAFTA.

[magellan]

25. I suppose it might be because they still have to pay the cost up front

Regardless of whether they absorb it or pass it on to the customer, that can still be crippling. I've heard stories lately of independent gas station owners who are having trouble paying to fill their tanks...They hold off, hoping the price may drop, and wind up with no gas to sell in the interim.

I guess we need to look at the bottom line. No matter what middlemen do, they pay for high fuel prices too -- if they pass their costs on then the price of goods goes up in turn, and they have cars and families who need to eat just like the rest of us.

[justice1]

9. It doesn't work that way.

Where my husband worked the fuel surcharge was set before he made the trip. We watched fuel jump before he even he left home, when the price came down, it was only a penny or two, so it never evened out.

[texastoast]

21. It works that way for the truckers I know

If a yard of material was $4.00 before, it is now about $4.80. The trucker I know has been in business for 30 years. When fuel goes up, material goes up.

[ThomWV]

17. Actually I Don't Think They Can Do That

Don't get me wrong, I don't know squat about it, but I did have to have something large shipped last year and I was just amazed by how tightly regulated the tares are for the shipping industry.

Also, just out of old habit, I keep a CB radio in my truck and its on most of the time when I'm out on the interstates. Locally there's too much bullshit on it to listen but on the highway its a lot better. Anyway the independent owners get screwed at every turn. I have little doubt that if there is a cost squeeze anywhere in the transportation chain it is those guys and gals who are gonna take it like a broke-down double-barrel.

[texastoast]

22. Highly regulated, yes

I suppose it has to do with the type of shipping. I'm most familiar with hot shot runs and material hauling.

I sure miss the CB days. I used to have a blast driving out I-10 in West Texas talking to the truckers. Kept me awake.

[madrchsod]

4. well if you owned a truck and had to buy fuel

you`d be pissed too. independent truckers live on thin margins and the fuel hike is killing them while walmart and other corporate trucking can pass increases on to the consumer

[stepnw1f]

12. I Expect Independent Drivers....

to be pissed.

[justice1]

5. They have been angry for quite some time.

The fuel surcharge we received was not enough to offset our costs. We lost our health insurance, and still were barely able to make it. It finally got to the point that we sold the truck in November, and he took a local driving job. At least the kids have insurance now.

[cornflake_31]

8. Truck drivers brought this upon themselves

when the teamsters backed Reagan in '80 over Carter. Screw em. As a member of a labor union, I have never understood why a working person would vote republican. They picked sides then and they payed for it.

[newyawker99]

24. Hi cornflake_31!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[justice1]

26. Most drivers today, were kids in 1980.

[AlCzervik]

11. my friends husband has a small trucking company, the fleet bills

are killing them.

[stepnw1f]

13. Pretty Safe to Say Everybody is Gonna Get Hit (nt)

[AlCzervik]

14. he's worried, he's actually driving again after having to let a driver go

everytime i see him he looks like he's going to work himself in to an early grave.

[stepnw1f]

16. Sorry to Hear That (nt)

[Horse with no Name]

18. To me this is one of the biggest dangers out there

Not long ago (I don't have link) Bush relaxed the laws on how much truck drivers can drive.
Now--they will ALL have to max their hours under the relaxed guidelines (which means MANY will be driving even over that) in order to be able to make a living because of gas prices.
Tired truckers on the roads will mean more accidents.

[mconvente]

27. my father is a truck driver

Fuel prices after 9/11 (plus a non-desire of people to travel - he had his own car-hauling business) led him to sell the business and get a job with a television company (NEP, Inc.) - he drives a $4 million audio trailer around to various sporting events; he did the whole season of Monday Night Football and now he's doing the NJ Devils hockey playoff series.

Lucky for him, he doesn't pay for diesel. But these outrageous prices are KILLING the trucking industry, which flies under the radar as being a backbone of this economy. No truckers = no transportation of goods. Even if you used railway, you still need 18-wheelers to bring goods to individual areas of our country. Truckers (especially owner-operators) are already hard working and stretched for cash, and the fuel prices are crippling them.