Walmart truckers to start at $95k a year(axios.com)
axios.com
Walmart truckers to start at $95k a year
https://www.axios.com/walmart-trucker-salary-9bc06c92-4da5-45d4-bc95-39795f75e015.html
21 comments
> On the other hand, I think long haul trucking will be one of, if not the first job to be 100% replaced by self-driving vehicles.
As someone who spent a good portion of his career in robotics and specifically self-driving cars (including the big companies with billions of dollars, not the me-too startups), I disagree.
Most people aren't as cynical as me, but I left the field entirely. I doubt it will happen within the decade, at least in a way that's profitable. I'm skeptical it will happen within 25 years. It's not hard to demo the technology to convince people it's almost here (I should know, as I often helped stage the demos for investors). But self-driving cars have been 2 years away for almost a decade now. I really think it's similar to nuclear fusion. Some people might remember when Google put a blind man in a self-driving car as a promotion. That was over 10 years ago. I'm not saying there has been no progress, but there is still a giant chasm of unsolved problems before getting to the finish line.
https://www.theverge.com/2012/3/29/2910196/google-self-drivi...
That said, I'm happy to be wrong.
As someone who spent a good portion of his career in robotics and specifically self-driving cars (including the big companies with billions of dollars, not the me-too startups), I disagree.
Most people aren't as cynical as me, but I left the field entirely. I doubt it will happen within the decade, at least in a way that's profitable. I'm skeptical it will happen within 25 years. It's not hard to demo the technology to convince people it's almost here (I should know, as I often helped stage the demos for investors). But self-driving cars have been 2 years away for almost a decade now. I really think it's similar to nuclear fusion. Some people might remember when Google put a blind man in a self-driving car as a promotion. That was over 10 years ago. I'm not saying there has been no progress, but there is still a giant chasm of unsolved problems before getting to the finish line.
https://www.theverge.com/2012/3/29/2910196/google-self-drivi...
That said, I'm happy to be wrong.
Having hauled a trailer, I'm not sure how an AI is going to deal with high wind or mountain passes. I think there is a naive understanding of long haul, but it is surprisingly hard to drive with a massive sail on your bed.
There is also the off-highway challenges, you still have all the same requirements as full car automation in dense districts, except now you're in a long and wide truck managing a highly-destructive amount of tonnage. Sure the majority is on the highway, but your trailer has a destination, and your truck a depot, and it's often somewhere dense and busy. I think for full automation soon, it could only happen for specific routes and operations that have set themselves up on the highways with minimal challenges off-highway. Like grain hauling.
You could have the trailers dropped off at depots by bots and taken into town by drivers, but at that point you're building infrastructure specifically for highway hauling and still using local trucks for the last mile, you may as well have built a rail network.
You could have the trailers dropped off at depots by bots and taken into town by drivers, but at that point you're building infrastructure specifically for highway hauling and still using local trucks for the last mile, you may as well have built a rail network.
It would make more sense to put rfid tags into those rubber reflectors and put those on the freeways and have trucks follow those then do all of the work for full self driving, cheaper too. A human driver can take over for the last mile. The truck would read the rfid tags and each would have a database entry of the gps of each tag.
You still need full self driving I think. Car cuts you off, tire flat where and when does it pull off? Load gets unbalanced, wind shear throws you off line, road ragers, unexpected hazards, unmarked construction zones, weather and road condition changes.. you get it. I think the remote driver is going to be too slow to respond in the majority of cases where circumstances are unexpected. What about load too, not having enough drivers to respond to incidents at peak wouldn't really be acceptable.
I think it's useful to note that we haven't even fully automated trains yet, which should show that even when most variables are accounted for you still need a robust detection and decision engine at the helm.
I think it's useful to note that we haven't even fully automated trains yet, which should show that even when most variables are accounted for you still need a robust detection and decision engine at the helm.
Maybe they should just automate the long sectors and then a human jumps in the cab to drive the truck for the last few complicated miles. The humans would probably prefer that too (for the most part) since they could go home every night.
If they have to share roads with other drivers or the roads are unprotected from the elements, people, animals, debris, etc, you'd still need human-level intelligence to prevent harm or catastrophic loss.
That's exactly what will happen but who's going to pay a trucker 95k a year to park trucks 8 hours a day 5 days a week?
If everything else was in place for this to work, I don't think you'd have to pay someone $95k to do it. To me, the $95k pay rate has a lot to do with the time on the road and away from home. Walmart might have to pay $95k for that now, but as autonomous driving takes on some of those miles, the human pay will likely go down (adjusted for inflation).
If low latency, high bandwidth satellite internet becomes common couldn't there be a remote pool of drivers that monitor and take over when needed?
That's very interesting way of looking at it - we do not need to fully automate cars to put millions people out of work. If we just create automated assistants (similar to plane autopilots) that takes care of 80% of work we can then create remote driving centers for people (drone pilots) that take over when thinks go wrong.
Add some specialized road patrols to handle the on ground problems (changing tires) and driving truck as a job will go from one of the most popular jobs to an outlier.
Love the idea, but this sounds exceptionally difficult to legislate for and regulate properly. Who is liable in case the remote operator makes a mistake?
What if the remote operator does not make a mistake, but the connection is not stable?
Do the remote operators need full HGV licences? Could they be outsourced to a third party? A third party in another country?
What if the remote operator does not make a mistake, but the connection is not stable?
Do the remote operators need full HGV licences? Could they be outsourced to a third party? A third party in another country?
And what happens when air traffic controller make mistake? Or the terminal malfunctions? This somehow did not limit air travel boom. Those are really minor problems when there are thrillions to be made.
> And what happens when air traffic controller make mistake
Then the human pilots in control of the aeroplanes try not to crash into each other.
Then the human pilots in control of the aeroplanes try not to crash into each other.
You don't even need satellite internet... Realistically power might be biggest issue. Otherwise you can just bury some fiber next or under the road and then use terrestrial solutions. Probably with decent beam forming directionally over the road you don't even need that many base stations.
The infrastructure around both long-haul and last-mile or LTL truck transport is already a thing, so in some circumstances the game doesn’t change that much under this model.
Train transport is unfortunately extraordinarily complicated in comparison. It’s a great option in some cases, but a totally non-viable option in many others.
Train transport is unfortunately extraordinarily complicated in comparison. It’s a great option in some cases, but a totally non-viable option in many others.
It's true, the other upside to the road network is that it already exists, and so private companies can use it now not after a long period of lobbying to get rail introduced when it does make sense.
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I expect it will be much like harbor pilots pulling ships into crowded ports: the tricky stuff will be handled by highly skilled humans, the easy stuff (long highway miles through cornfields ok flyover states) by AIs.
There will be a few exhaustively mapped and highly trafficked main routes where the truckers will carefully pull out of a warehouse and drive to the onramp, get out, and take a shuttle back to the warehouse. The truck will drive itself continuously for the next 30 hours/2000 miles, and pull itself into a rest stop outside the target city, where another trucker will drive it the remainder of the trip.
There will be a few exhaustively mapped and highly trafficked main routes where the truckers will carefully pull out of a warehouse and drive to the onramp, get out, and take a shuttle back to the warehouse. The truck will drive itself continuously for the next 30 hours/2000 miles, and pull itself into a rest stop outside the target city, where another trucker will drive it the remainder of the trip.
I wonder how hard and how much more expensive it would be to build a warehouse designed for automated trucks. Seems like it shouldn't be too much trouble to have closed off sections where only automated trucks are allowed for most of the time. And then they would feed to special access roads designed to be safe and easy to navigate.
What if there is an accident along the main route and a diversion is set up down side roads that haven't been exhaustively mapped?
Ironically those kinds of things are the things AI deals with most easily. That's all math and physics. The hard part is understanding the environment and adapting the the unexpected.
That is the hard part, and the high wind on mountains create interesting and unexpected scenarios. Mountains are primarily a slow-going thing, but wind bursts create insane environments which are really only felt.
It's going to be a factory of edge cases for both the AI to handle directly and interpret of other vehicles.
It's going to be a factory of edge cases for both the AI to handle directly and interpret of other vehicles.
My father was a truck driver and from the stories I've heard, yes I think it's a very difficult job in a lot of cases. eg. hauling doubles (two trailers linked together) during snow storms down steep inclines and having to fight the back of the trailer jack knifing as it swings one way, then the other, over and over until at the bottom of a slope.
I would imagine that would be exactly the sort of things that robots could actually handle much better than humans. You would load up the trucks and trailers with sensors so that the AI knows exactly what is happening, force wise on every part of the trailer with millisecond accuracy, including full data on things like friction under the wheels, and the road surface temperature and road conditions ahead. Add a detailed 3D map of the whole road and the robot driver should handle this fine. Robots will even have advantages over humans since they can do things like control exact levels of breaking, power and even steering to each wheel independently giving them far more manoeuvring options than what a human has.
I'm sure it would be possible, but I would assume controlling fish tailing tractor trailers in snow would be on the harder end of the spectrum of automating truck driver problems. It is a hard problem and there is a lot more risk to human life than automating a taxi in a city. Even if they perform better than real life drivers, it seems like we are trending towards requiring perfection and we might be a long way out to a scalable solution.
controlling fish tailing tractor trailers in snow would be on the harder end of the spectrum of automating truck driver problems
Yes and no. On the one hand it's hard problem because of all the variables involved, on the other hand it's easy because it's 'just' a physics problem. There is no trying to second guess the intentions of other humans acting weirdly, no trying to decipher hastily erected diversion signs, no trying to interpret what that guy standing in the road waving a sign at you actually wants you to do etc.
Yes and no. On the one hand it's hard problem because of all the variables involved, on the other hand it's easy because it's 'just' a physics problem. There is no trying to second guess the intentions of other humans acting weirdly, no trying to decipher hastily erected diversion signs, no trying to interpret what that guy standing in the road waving a sign at you actually wants you to do etc.
> There is no trying to second guess the intentions of other humans acting weirdly
It would still have to contend with humans even in the snow storm scenario.
It would still have to contend with humans even in the snow storm scenario.
Airliners have been dealing with high winds for decades.
> I'm not sure how an AI is going to deal with high wind or mountain passes.
Better than humans, probably.
> I'm not sure how an AI is going to deal with high wind or mountain passes.
Better than humans, probably.
Airliners have it easier though. Hitting a weird wind pocket means a plane might drop 50 feet and everyone on board jolts awake and drinks spill. In a truck that’s a catastrophic crash. And no planes have zero pilots to take over..
My car's traction-control reacts faster than any human; often the dash light is the only indication I have that the car had lost traction for a fraction of a second and corrected for it. I don't see how automated systems would struggle with "sudden" wind changes that take humans half a second or more to react (which is eons for computers at modern clock speeds).
> I'm not sure how an AI is going to deal with high wind or mountain passes.
More sensors? It shouldn't be too difficult to detect cross-wind or shear forces: I'm not in robotics, but I can think of several different ways to do this (sensing sideways forces applied by trailer to the coupling, or laser emitter/sensor pair or even a camera on the truck with high-contrast markers affixed onto the trailer
More sensors? It shouldn't be too difficult to detect cross-wind or shear forces: I'm not in robotics, but I can think of several different ways to do this (sensing sideways forces applied by trailer to the coupling, or laser emitter/sensor pair or even a camera on the truck with high-contrast markers affixed onto the trailer
I don’t think mountain passes are low-hanging-fruit. But high winds should be more doable, in fact with wind sensors on trucks you might be able to have a lot of stabilization that even beats a human. A human is skilled but reacting to stimuli from their perch in the cab.
This is my sense of things as an outsider, so it's nice to hear an inside account that matches up with that. That said, I wonder if there's some room for human and AI cooperation here to help the driver, perhaps with the humans as safety drivers able to focus on other tasks or perhaps even nap while the truck is under ideal self driving conditions and then take over when there is a situation ahead that requires human attention? From everything Truckers say, it's an extremely stressful job due to a number of factors, and I wonder if there is some way to apply technology to actually make the job more tolerable.
I would _love_ to see people pursue this sort of line. I see people make really simple mistakes that could be easily corrected when they drive. For instance, I think a HUD that told you how far ahead of you, in seconds, the next car was would do wonders. New drivers actually measure this and keep proper distance, but in my experience, experienced drivers adopt the norm of the driving culture, which is too short. I have asked people who care to be safe drivers how far the car ahead of them was, after I counted, and gotten answers that were way off.
It's crazy to me people are so bullish on self driving cars. This is _exactly_ the sort of problem that humans are better at than computers - it's about exercising sound judgement in the face of novelty. I don't think humans are bad drivers, I think we have a toxic driving culture. I think if we found a way to professionalize driving, that didn't undermine the rights of employees by turning everyone into contractors, we could develop a healthy driving culture. Something closer to what exists in aviation.
It is my observation that driving is not something you do with your full attention. It is a means to an end. And that leads to "get there itis", aggressive driving, all sorts of shenanigans.
It's crazy to me people are so bullish on self driving cars. This is _exactly_ the sort of problem that humans are better at than computers - it's about exercising sound judgement in the face of novelty. I don't think humans are bad drivers, I think we have a toxic driving culture. I think if we found a way to professionalize driving, that didn't undermine the rights of employees by turning everyone into contractors, we could develop a healthy driving culture. Something closer to what exists in aviation.
It is my observation that driving is not something you do with your full attention. It is a means to an end. And that leads to "get there itis", aggressive driving, all sorts of shenanigans.
> I think if we found a way to professionalize driving, that didn't undermine the rights of employees by turning everyone into contractors, we could develop a healthy driving culture.
Many (most?) truck drivers today that work as a part of a larger fleet have dash cams and in-cabin cameras that use AI/ML vision algorithms to evaluate how safely they drive.
Coca-Cola really doesn't want to get sued for tens of millions of dollars because one of their truck drivers hit a pedestrian while he was checking his cell phone.
Many (most?) truck drivers today that work as a part of a larger fleet have dash cams and in-cabin cameras that use AI/ML vision algorithms to evaluate how safely they drive.
Coca-Cola really doesn't want to get sued for tens of millions of dollars because one of their truck drivers hit a pedestrian while he was checking his cell phone.
Not most. Inside cameras are still controversial, but outside cameras are almost standard. It's mostly for avoiding lawsuits rather than anything else.
Also, all of the AI/ML is terrible (like almost everywhere else).
Also, all of the AI/ML is terrible (like almost everywhere else).
Couldn’t agree more. Seeing body bags at accidents on just about every commute in a large city (LV) between home/school really made that point for me. It started to feel like that city was engaging in some weird daily sacrifice since no one talks about “gee maybe we should drive more safely?” Or just ludicrously violent.
Road design plays a massive part in accident rates but it's often unacknowledged as a factor. Many roads in the USA combine high-speed design (wide lanes, multiple lanes, clear zones) with frequent turns, intersections, busy shopping plazas with entering and exiting traffic, and generally complex traffic flows. To be safe around turns and intersections, traffic should be slow, but everything about the road design is telling our subconscious mind "it's safe to go fast here", regardless of the speed limit.
> multiple lanes
I'll bite. Suppose you have enough peak traffic that multiple lanes are necessary to transport it even at low speeds. What do you do instead?
I'll bite. Suppose you have enough peak traffic that multiple lanes are necessary to transport it even at low speeds. What do you do instead?
I think adding more lanes is a mental trap. It seems like when you have a lot of traffic, what you need to do is add more capacity to your road. But that doesn't end up working the way you'd expect, roads aren't like pipelines, because a road network is not only capacity for transportation but a subtle system of incentives. It's easy to add capacity and lose throughput because you change people's decision making and reap results you didn't anticipate.
So, I would say, invest in a bus system to make better use of the lanes you have. Invest in a subway system to give people safe, cheap alternatives to car ownership. Change zoning so that people don't have to travel so far to get where they want to go.
These are all incredibly expensive, a subway is certainly more expensive than adding a lane, but they have the advantage of actually addressing the problem. Transport really matters and we need to pony up for it, and we'll reap the benefits for generations.
So, I would say, invest in a bus system to make better use of the lanes you have. Invest in a subway system to give people safe, cheap alternatives to car ownership. Change zoning so that people don't have to travel so far to get where they want to go.
These are all incredibly expensive, a subway is certainly more expensive than adding a lane, but they have the advantage of actually addressing the problem. Transport really matters and we need to pony up for it, and we'll reap the benefits for generations.
> But self-driving cars have been 2 years away for almost a decade now. I really think it's similar to nuclear fusion.
Literally last week it was being discussed that Waymo now offers full self driving in SF right now. Unless I’m missing something, the future you’re saying is akin to fusion has just happened.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30855624
Literally last week it was being discussed that Waymo now offers full self driving in SF right now. Unless I’m missing something, the future you’re saying is akin to fusion has just happened.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30855624
If you look in to why Waymo started “full self driving” in Arizona and, now, San Francisco it’s because the cars cannot even drive in light rain and the entire fleet is garaged with even mild inclement weather. We are still lightyears away from actual self-driving cars that can manage variable weather and even slightly-unpredictable terrain.
> If you look in to why Waymo started “full self driving” in Arizona and, now, San Francisco it’s because the cars cannot even drive in light rain and the entire fleet is garaged with even mild inclement weather. We are still lightyears away from actual self-driving cars that can manage variable weather and even slightly-unpredictable terrain.
It rains in SF and there’s even fog… The fog’s name is Karl by the way. It’s also an old coastal city that doesn’t have a sane layout that you might expect from a test area like Arizona. SF is not an easy challenge and there are plenty of self-driving startups that have tried there and failed.
It rains in SF and there’s even fog… The fog’s name is Karl by the way. It’s also an old coastal city that doesn’t have a sane layout that you might expect from a test area like Arizona. SF is not an easy challenge and there are plenty of self-driving startups that have tried there and failed.
> It rains in SF
It hasn't rained regularly for years. We're in a bad drought, or as some other people put it, a new normal of very little rainfall.
It hasn't rained regularly for years. We're in a bad drought, or as some other people put it, a new normal of very little rainfall.
Self-driving cars that "only" work on non-rainy days = self-driving cars available 90%+ of the time in sunbelt states.
I have no idea why people minimize level 4 self driving. It would absolutely be enough for most people in those geofenced areas/cities to no longer need a car, would massively drive down drunk-driving deaths, and would be a huge benefit for the blind, the elderly, the rural poor, children, etc.
I have no idea why people minimize level 4 self driving. It would absolutely be enough for most people in those geofenced areas/cities to no longer need a car, would massively drive down drunk-driving deaths, and would be a huge benefit for the blind, the elderly, the rural poor, children, etc.
Maybe it's not hapoening soon, but what they said was that it would happen there first.
You don't think it will happen in simpler environments before more complex ones?
I think the first examples, whenever that happens to be, will be on highways and more than that, only between special endpoints, IE yards with their own ramps. The vehicle never leaves the highway or the dedicated enpoints, no local ramps. possibly special areas of some rest stops for charging. They will be just a new form of port or train station.
You don't think it will happen in simpler environments before more complex ones?
I think the first examples, whenever that happens to be, will be on highways and more than that, only between special endpoints, IE yards with their own ramps. The vehicle never leaves the highway or the dedicated enpoints, no local ramps. possibly special areas of some rest stops for charging. They will be just a new form of port or train station.
He only commented that when self-driving vehicles exist, long-haul trucking will be one of the first jobs replaced. Not how long it would take.
I agree with him. IMO long-haul driving is the most ideal case for self-driving vehicles - the 'spherical cow' of physics. I imagine that they'll self-drive into depots right off the interstates, at which point humans will take over for the last leg.
I agree with him. IMO long-haul driving is the most ideal case for self-driving vehicles - the 'spherical cow' of physics. I imagine that they'll self-drive into depots right off the interstates, at which point humans will take over for the last leg.
It might be a bit circular, but I'd go a step further and say that the lack of self driving in long haul trucking is evidence that general self driving is at least a decade away.
Humans need to choose job families that will exist their entire working life (40-50 years). Even if the technology takes 30 years to develop, drivers will be 50 years old and forced into early retirement due to.
I suspect that driver shortages will get worse before they get better, b/c if we are "25 years out" from self driving long haul trucks, ppl will shy away from that job category so they don't get caught jobless before they are ready to retire.
I suspect that driver shortages will get worse before they get better, b/c if we are "25 years out" from self driving long haul trucks, ppl will shy away from that job category so they don't get caught jobless before they are ready to retire.
Assuming you live somewhere that's somewhat affordable and self driving is a couple of decades off then 95k/year to follow the FIRE model.
Very very very very few people are both capable and interested in FIRE. Many software engineers could follow the FIRE model and retire before they are 40, but they choose to remain in the work force.
Even FIRE bloggers don't actually FIRE. They continue to support their blog or get bored and return to the work force.
Our brains are wired to "keep up with the Jone's".
Even FIRE bloggers don't actually FIRE. They continue to support their blog or get bored and return to the work force.
Our brains are wired to "keep up with the Jone's".
What about SAE Level 2 self-driving à la the Comma Three: the driver is still there, but turning and braking is taken care of by the computer. Automate the drudgery to reduce mental fatigue.
The operator is just there to scan the conditions and make sure nothing is going off the rails.
The operator is just there to scan the conditions and make sure nothing is going off the rails.
Tow truck drivers are making a killing on youtube right now. Humans cant drive cars/trucks/properly; robots have no chance. Not with the current tech promoted as "AI".
I think I agree as I am not in that space my go to reason is that if it would be easy, we would have fully automated trains with no train drivers already.
Waymo is San Francisco is actually doing a fantastic job. With just what we have there we could do most driving, maybe even including last mile.
> On the other hand, I think long haul trucking will be one of, if not the first job to be 100% replaced by self-driving vehicles.
Used to think that way (checks calendar) 7 years ago. I've seen what "top-notch" AI can do, it's failure rate, and lack of any form of corporate responsibility, to be doubtful.
Used to think that way (checks calendar) 7 years ago. I've seen what "top-notch" AI can do, it's failure rate, and lack of any form of corporate responsibility, to be doubtful.
Not to mention that the self-driving vehicle used for elevator travel has been readily available and reliable for over a century, yet we still hire elevator operators in niche situations. Even if self-driving truck tech was perfect, it's probably not going to 100% replace the job. There will always be some outlier situation where the human is needed and replacing one or two people is never worth enough to invest even more money into automating for that specific situation.
I am 33 years old, decently well-traveled, and I'm not sure I've ever encountered an elevator operator where they were required.
I've seen them in a couple spiffy places, but it felt like the establishment was trying to flex on the patrons by paying a well-dressed man to push a button for me.
I've also seen elevator operators in old-timey historical buildings, but here it feels like the operator is employed just because the elevator has a museum-esque status. There are still people that know how to drive a horse and buggy as well - do you think this would be any consolation to the horse and buggy drivers of yesteryear?
I've seen them in a couple spiffy places, but it felt like the establishment was trying to flex on the patrons by paying a well-dressed man to push a button for me.
I've also seen elevator operators in old-timey historical buildings, but here it feels like the operator is employed just because the elevator has a museum-esque status. There are still people that know how to drive a horse and buggy as well - do you think this would be any consolation to the horse and buggy drivers of yesteryear?
> I've seen them in a couple spiffy places, but it felt like the establishment was trying to flex on the patrons by paying a well-dressed man to push a button for me.
Or, more likely, the operator is doing something closer to the job of security guard under the guise of elevator operator. Which, as it happens, is a really nice fit for long haul trucker discussion. It is almost certain that at least some trips will demand someone to ride along if for no other reason than to care for the load. That would be fairly considered the job of a long haul trucker.
But, if we want to say that 100% of elevator operator jobs have been eliminated and that people appearing as elevator operators today are really doing some other job (security guard, wealth flexer, museum curator), the idea of long haul trucker being the first to go at the hand of a self-driving vehicle as stated earlier doesn't jive.
Or, more likely, the operator is doing something closer to the job of security guard under the guise of elevator operator. Which, as it happens, is a really nice fit for long haul trucker discussion. It is almost certain that at least some trips will demand someone to ride along if for no other reason than to care for the load. That would be fairly considered the job of a long haul trucker.
But, if we want to say that 100% of elevator operator jobs have been eliminated and that people appearing as elevator operators today are really doing some other job (security guard, wealth flexer, museum curator), the idea of long haul trucker being the first to go at the hand of a self-driving vehicle as stated earlier doesn't jive.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median annual income for truck drivers in 2014 was $39,520. The bottom 10% of truck drivers earned a median of $25,740, while the top 10% brought home a median of $61,150.
From a trucking website, truckers get a bare working class income. But truckers also have intense pressure to work many, many hours, trucking working conditions are effectively nothing to write home about.
So no, not often a very lucrative career.
https://www.primeinc.com/trucking-blogs/much-truck-drivers-g...
From a trucking website, truckers get a bare working class income. But truckers also have intense pressure to work many, many hours, trucking working conditions are effectively nothing to write home about.
So no, not often a very lucrative career.
https://www.primeinc.com/trucking-blogs/much-truck-drivers-g...
> On the other hand, I think long haul trucking will be one of, if not the first job to be 100% replaced by self-driving vehicles.
I doubt it, trains and airplanes are as close to automated shipping as we're going to get for a while. Self-driving systems aren't anywhere near ready for personal transportation, and commercial shipping via automated trucks introduces even more complexity and liability.
I suspect that driving on tracks that aren't purpose-built for automated transportation requires levels of general human-like intelligence that we aren't even close to reaching with current approaches and tech.
I doubt it, trains and airplanes are as close to automated shipping as we're going to get for a while. Self-driving systems aren't anywhere near ready for personal transportation, and commercial shipping via automated trucks introduces even more complexity and liability.
I suspect that driving on tracks that aren't purpose-built for automated transportation requires levels of general human-like intelligence that we aren't even close to reaching with current approaches and tech.
Yeah, once self-driving tech gets convincingly good enough, I suspect we'll see the left lane of highways be self-driving-only for certain hours in the middle of the night.
You could charge the self-driving trucks a hefty tax as they pass through your flyover state, and raise the speed limit for them in return.
Empty highways are just underutilized bandwidth.
You could charge the self-driving trucks a hefty tax as they pass through your flyover state, and raise the speed limit for them in return.
Empty highways are just underutilized bandwidth.
I wonder if speeds might not even go lower in case of automated trucks. Just to save on fuel. That is for not time critical cargo. It is already something that happened with shipping.
Does anyone remember the 1st Fast and the Furious movie? The big premise for it (which at the time I found completely unrealistic) was that the anti-hero criminals would hijack long haul trunks. This will become a reality soon since people have been robbing freight train cars again. I'm not sure how companies will respond to the threat.
Trucking isn't going to be replaced soon because it's not a lucrative career. I mean, truckers might make six figures, but those truckers are also paying gas out of their own pocket. Even before any other expenses, 2/3 of a trucker's "salary" (really income) may be going to fuel. More goes to maintenance.
So, going full EV has huge cost savings. Getting rid of the driver, not so much. The problem, other than the cost of the bigger EV cab, is recharging is too damn slow.
So, going full EV has huge cost savings. Getting rid of the driver, not so much. The problem, other than the cost of the bigger EV cab, is recharging is too damn slow.
Company drivers, like the ones discussed in this article, don’t pay for their own fuel. Owner-operators do, but they also get to set their own rates, so they’re in control of how much money they make (subject to what the market will bear, of course).
> Owner-operators do, but they also get to set their own rates, so they’re in control
Sometimes. 1099 mislabeling is rampant in trucking, as is locking "owner operators" to a single company via owing outrageous sums for training (that get forgiven over 2-3 years) or from leasing the trucks directly from their sole customer.
At the very least, a company seeking shipping services almost certainly goes through a dispatching company, not directly to an owner-operator. So there's not really negotiating there. Sure, maybe you can refuse routes, but maybe you stop getting asked to perform them.
John Oliver just put out a piece on the abuse of 1099s in the trucking industry this past Sunday. You should check it out. I'm not saying you should take what he says as the gospel truth, but it's a more reliable source than nothing.
Sometimes. 1099 mislabeling is rampant in trucking, as is locking "owner operators" to a single company via owing outrageous sums for training (that get forgiven over 2-3 years) or from leasing the trucks directly from their sole customer.
At the very least, a company seeking shipping services almost certainly goes through a dispatching company, not directly to an owner-operator. So there's not really negotiating there. Sure, maybe you can refuse routes, but maybe you stop getting asked to perform them.
John Oliver just put out a piece on the abuse of 1099s in the trucking industry this past Sunday. You should check it out. I'm not saying you should take what he says as the gospel truth, but it's a more reliable source than nothing.
I’ll check it out; thanks!
Automated battery-swap stations might finally start to make sense with self-driving EV trucks.
EVs get away with charging overnight because humans also have to charge overnight when they sleep. But if there's no human driver, and just a big fancy truck instead, you (an investor) really don't want that massive capital investment idling for hours every day just to charge itself.
I can easily imagine people making a killing by charging up a bunch of batteries in a really sunny place, then having their robots swap out trucks' batteries as they pass through.
EVs get away with charging overnight because humans also have to charge overnight when they sleep. But if there's no human driver, and just a big fancy truck instead, you (an investor) really don't want that massive capital investment idling for hours every day just to charge itself.
I can easily imagine people making a killing by charging up a bunch of batteries in a really sunny place, then having their robots swap out trucks' batteries as they pass through.
Or you can catenary the roadways: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_3P_S7pL7Yg
Battery swap is a hard problem. Vehicle design is hard. Dealing with the real costs of shitty batteries is hard (who owns which batteries with how much life on them) is hard. Moving heavy objects safely and routinely by minimum wage labor is hard.
Pick-and-place factory jobs were not lucrative either, but got automated simply because robots are better at it. Having human drivers that get tired and have a legislated maximum number of hours they can drive in a day (for a good reason) leads to inefficiencies that Walmart may be eager to get rid of: some fruits, for example, have a small window between ripening and going bad, being able to deliver produce faster in general will be a huge plus.
An automatic truck doesn't go faster per mile. If it were really valuable, they would pair people up in trucks and have them alternate shifts driving. And that might be what happens with EVs, because the costs of trucks might actually be the limiting factor for a while.
> An automatic truck doesn't go faster per mile.
Of course it would, if it doesn't have to stop for 8+ hours per day.
> If it were really valuable, they would pair people up in trucks and have them alternate shifts driving
You're ignoring a whole bunch of human factors (including cost vs speed trade-offs), but you'e right; some truckers do get paired up.
Of course it would, if it doesn't have to stop for 8+ hours per day.
> If it were really valuable, they would pair people up in trucks and have them alternate shifts driving
You're ignoring a whole bunch of human factors (including cost vs speed trade-offs), but you'e right; some truckers do get paired up.
I don’t see why long haul trucking even exists. Maybe scale and capacity is more of an issue than I’m aware of, but, nothing seems to really prevent us from using rail for long hauls and then trucking for the last mile or hundred. Having one driver dedicated to hauling one single container/trailer across the country has always seemed unproductive to me and I don’t understand why it’s so prevalent. However I’m completely ignorant to the constraints and economics on the matter.
> Maybe scale and capacity is more of an issue than I’m aware of, but, nothing seems to really prevent us from using rail for long hauls and then trucking for the last mile or hundred.
You're describing multi-modal shipping.
As I understand it, rail has a ton more throughput at lower cost with longer and more varied latency. So trucks are necessary for perishable food and JIT shipments, the delay of which could idle a factory. There's also a concern for the closeness of the nearest rail receiving facilities.
There's also the short-haul use for trucks. It's not worth putting on a train to go 100 miles.
You're describing multi-modal shipping.
As I understand it, rail has a ton more throughput at lower cost with longer and more varied latency. So trucks are necessary for perishable food and JIT shipments, the delay of which could idle a factory. There's also a concern for the closeness of the nearest rail receiving facilities.
There's also the short-haul use for trucks. It's not worth putting on a train to go 100 miles.
> I don’t see why long haul trucking even exists. Maybe scale and capacity is more of an issue than I’m aware of, but, nothing seems to really prevent us from using rail for long hauls and then trucking for the last mile or hundred.
Short-notice deliveries where you may not get be able to get a 'slot' on a train. Oddly shaped loads. Heavy loads.
The YouTube channel of Sergei Dratchev:
> I'm an independent trucker from Canada who specializes in moving heavy equipment between Canada & USA. Truck: 2019 Kenworth T880 (4 axles) Trailer: 2018 60 ton RGN (also have a tandem jeep and stinger).. Yard location: Cambridge, ON Canada. Company name: Sergei Dratchev Heavy Haul. Find me on Google or visit:
* https://www.youtube.com/user/smd5231/videos
Short-notice deliveries where you may not get be able to get a 'slot' on a train. Oddly shaped loads. Heavy loads.
The YouTube channel of Sergei Dratchev:
> I'm an independent trucker from Canada who specializes in moving heavy equipment between Canada & USA. Truck: 2019 Kenworth T880 (4 axles) Trailer: 2018 60 ton RGN (also have a tandem jeep and stinger).. Yard location: Cambridge, ON Canada. Company name: Sergei Dratchev Heavy Haul. Find me on Google or visit:
* https://www.youtube.com/user/smd5231/videos
I do know of at least one scenerio: boats.
Some boats are simply too tall or too wide for trains to carry, but a truck can pull them straight to a dealer without worrying about being an oversize load.
Some boats are simply too tall or too wide for trains to carry, but a truck can pull them straight to a dealer without worrying about being an oversize load.
Probably because the government is willing to pay for a highway system but not rails
Given the complexity of last-mile and the stated predictability of highway driving, wouldn't we see drivers sleeping while the truck was on the highway? Seems a bit pointless to have staff rostered to pick up vehicles for the last mile when they could just sleep in easier stints that the vehicle can manage itself.
I think low-speed and light-weight campus taxis will be one of the first areas to go.
I think low-speed and light-weight campus taxis will be one of the first areas to go.
> wouldn't we see drivers sleeping while the truck was on the highway?
What, and get paid for sleeping? Snark aside; it will just tie up drivers to one per truck. instead, trucks can drive themselves between depots/warehouses, and humans will do the last mile (1 driver:many trucks) and the driver can go sleep in their own home at night and be off the clock.
What, and get paid for sleeping? Snark aside; it will just tie up drivers to one per truck. instead, trucks can drive themselves between depots/warehouses, and humans will do the last mile (1 driver:many trucks) and the driver can go sleep in their own home at night and be off the clock.
Interstate driving is not easy. It's just slightly easier than intense urban traffic, and that's for normal passengers vehicles.
A 70-ft 40-ton semi truck is an entirely different challenge. There's a magnitude more things to worry about from wind speed to weight transfer and it's nowhere near as simple as plugging in the current self-driving AIs on "highway" mode.
A 70-ft 40-ton semi truck is an entirely different challenge. There's a magnitude more things to worry about from wind speed to weight transfer and it's nowhere near as simple as plugging in the current self-driving AIs on "highway" mode.
> 100% replaced by self-driving vehicles
In warm climates, yes, I’m sure it will. I’m more doubtful of this happening in snow country though.
In warm climates, yes, I’m sure it will. I’m more doubtful of this happening in snow country though.
70% of the world lives in places where it never snows, and a full half of the U.S. population never experiences snow at home.
"Self-driving cars can't expand to snowy areas" is a strange criticism of the business model.
"Self-driving cars can't expand to snowy areas" is a strange criticism of the business model.
The target customers are the wealthy that can afford it. Where so they live?
I would just like NYC to still receive their goods
Then the pay can be even higher as you’d be managing basically a road train of trucks.
That's not how labour markets work.
It is, if demand for the services keeps up with the expanded capacity. Pay can be higher without risking demand destruction due to high costs. If demand doesn’t keep up, then sure, wages could even be lower than today. But I suspect if we expand capacity, growth in demand for shipping will make up for it.
Wages as with most non-rent prices are driven by substitutability. If another worker is willing to do the job for less pay, then that sets the market price. Productivity is not a factor, though skills, risk, training, trust, and overall attractiveness of the work may well be --- these are the five factors that Adam Smith identifies over 240 years ago.
The other factor might be some form of gating of labour supply through registration, credentialling, unionisation, or a professional organisation (a/k/a guild). These rely however on constraining supply and only succeed in securing remuneration based on suplus value through monopoly gatekeeping. Not because labour is compensated due to productivity.
The other factor might be some form of gating of labour supply through registration, credentialling, unionisation, or a professional organisation (a/k/a guild). These rely however on constraining supply and only succeed in securing remuneration based on suplus value through monopoly gatekeeping. Not because labour is compensated due to productivity.
About 10% of truck drivers own their trucks. Maybe that 10% will be able to handle the vast majority of truck traffic.
…but not if the tech is controlled centrally by large companies who take most of the profit from it.
…but not if the tech is controlled centrally by large companies who take most of the profit from it.
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> On the other hand, I think long haul trucking will be one of, if not the first job to be 100% replaced by self-driving vehicles.
Could this be the reason no one wants to go into Trucking?
Could this be the reason no one wants to go into Trucking?
>A self driving truck can go nonstop (gas/battery stops notwithstanding) for 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.
In the right weather/conditions, sure.
In the right weather/conditions, sure.
After watching Last Week Tonight talk about the multitude of ways that companies screw truckers, I wonder what asterisks are beside this salary number? Is that a straight salary number, or is it before expenses, or are there unpaid waiting hours, etc?
This position advertises "home once a week", so whether you are on the clock waiting or not, you probably aren't doing exactly what you want much of the time.
https://careers.walmart.com/us/jobs/1456060BR-truck-driver-8...
The $87,500 they post probably requires having the 30 months of recent driving experience, plenty of miles and safety bonuses.
https://careers.walmart.com/us/jobs/1456060BR-truck-driver-8...
The $87,500 they post probably requires having the 30 months of recent driving experience, plenty of miles and safety bonuses.
The main catch with Walmart is that you need a pristine driving record and can fire you for any small mistake.
Seems to be the case for any credentialed job. The thought of being a lawyer or a doctor whose entire livelihood can be removed with the stroke of a pen scares the shit out of me.
I once had a friend who was facing a serious trial. But we had to wait for his lawyer to get out of prison to represent him. I don't think they are held to the same standard.
If doctors or lawyers lost their livelihood for one mistake, we wouldn't have any doctors or lawyers.
You dont know how many doctors feel trapped by their profession. My ex didnt get mental help because it would stop her getting residencies.
Doctors, like DoD/contractors, Bankers, anything hi paying really; give their lives to their job. That includes limiting what they do at home, where they travel, who they speak too, how they act "out of the office".
Getting a career or sticking to a career are not indicative of happiness, security, or comfort.
Doctors, like DoD/contractors, Bankers, anything hi paying really; give their lives to their job. That includes limiting what they do at home, where they travel, who they speak too, how they act "out of the office".
Getting a career or sticking to a career are not indicative of happiness, security, or comfort.
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exfascist(1)
Last Week Tonight was the eighteen wheeled equivalent of projecting a crappy rookie game-dev job onto all of tech. Nobody who doesn't want to is putting up with that after they've been in the industry for any appreciable amount of time. It's the kind of thing you do for a few years to put experience on your resume.
The asterisks are you have to live in a truck, work crappy hours and be jerked around by dispatch, just like every other steering wheel holding dry van job. It's also not salaried so that "starting at 95k" is based on some number of miles. Walmart historically pays well in order to have their pick of top drivers. While they are a primarily dry van fleet, they're no Swift of Schneider so they expect high quality work to go with that pay. Driving over someone's planters will not sit well with them.
The asterisks are you have to live in a truck, work crappy hours and be jerked around by dispatch, just like every other steering wheel holding dry van job. It's also not salaried so that "starting at 95k" is based on some number of miles. Walmart historically pays well in order to have their pick of top drivers. While they are a primarily dry van fleet, they're no Swift of Schneider so they expect high quality work to go with that pay. Driving over someone's planters will not sit well with them.
I wonder if that includes commercial insurance? A quick google search says it's around 16k/year for a new driver [1]. I guess it makes sense, but wow!
1. https://www.forerunnerinsurance.com/what-does-average-semi-t...
1. https://www.forerunnerinsurance.com/what-does-average-semi-t...
That is for owner operators (people that own their own truck and pick up loads by contract). Walmart you are working for and insured by them. That is why they pay well and demand experience and a clean record. Lawsuits due to driver error cost a lot.
Tracy Morgan was seriously injured in an accident with a Walmart truck and got 10 million dollar settlement from Walmart
Tracy Morgan was seriously injured in an accident with a Walmart truck and got 10 million dollar settlement from Walmart
My understanding is that there is a huge difference in pay, respect, and corporate chicanery between short and long haul.
Essentially: no DUI (ever!), no texting while driving (ever!), no tickets in the last 3 years.
Surprisingly low percent of truck drivers can pass this.
Plus, many trucks have a driver-facing camera, no privacy.
Surprisingly low percent of truck drivers can pass this.
Plus, many trucks have a driver-facing camera, no privacy.
> no DUI (ever!)
Why the "ever!" addendum? Are you suggesting it is unreasonable to not have DUIs "ever!"?
Why the "ever!" addendum? Are you suggesting it is unreasonable to not have DUIs "ever!"?
It's just to emphasize that they may be lenient about some other tickets as long as they are way in the past, but they are not lenient about these ones.
These are reasonable conditions, but apparently they are not easy to pass.
I think the texting while driving is the more interesting one: a bunch of states don't care too much (Arizona, Montana, etc.), some others only impose a small $25 fine, so young people may not think about it as a huge obstacle to a high-paying job much later.
These are reasonable conditions, but apparently they are not easy to pass.
I think the texting while driving is the more interesting one: a bunch of states don't care too much (Arizona, Montana, etc.), some others only impose a small $25 fine, so young people may not think about it as a huge obstacle to a high-paying job much later.
While I am an annoying stickler for safe driving (I gave advanced driving school gift certs for Xmas), one of the thoughts is - if you made an whopsie when you were 16 years old, how much should that cost you when you are e.g. 27 or for rest of your life?
I am cognizant that not everybody makes brilliant decisions when they are young, and not all of them remain awful incorrigible human beings forever.
I am cognizant that not everybody makes brilliant decisions when they are young, and not all of them remain awful incorrigible human beings forever.
I've got a lot of respect for truck drivers - they violate the road rules a lot less than your average car driver - especially w.r.t not going over the center line, your average pickup truck driver is much worse.
I've also seen them enforce the road rules!
I was stuck in traffic on the PA turnpike, and some pickups were shooting down the shoulder to pass everyone. A truck moved over to straddle the shoulder to stop it.
I was stuck in traffic on the PA turnpike, and some pickups were shooting down the shoulder to pass everyone. A truck moved over to straddle the shoulder to stop it.
pickups are in a kind of uncanny valley - they're big enough that drivers have noticeable difficulty handling them, but not big enough to warrant needing separate training like you do with big trucks in most jurisdictions.
I think additional licensing for pickup trucks is a fantastic idea.
Isn’t that illegal ?
Yes. At least most places.
And what's worse, truckers often enforce their "rules" that aren't really laws. Like preventing zipper merges, which are proven to improve throughput when they are allowed to happen properly.
And what's worse, truckers often enforce their "rules" that aren't really laws. Like preventing zipper merges, which are proven to improve throughput when they are allowed to happen properly.
I have seen plenty of people in cars going out of their way to prevent zipper merges.
I live in a construction zone temporarily, while they build an overpass through the nearest intersection. Construction vehicles and windmill blade transport convoys are my favorite because they moderate the otherwise rude traffic through the chokepoint. (Austinites: this is just south of the Y)
This is such a physically demanding and brutally unsafe job so this is what I'd expect it to pay considering its hazards. It is not for everyone however.
Physically demanding? How many truckers do you know? It is among the most dangerous jobs in the US though; that's true of basically all transportation jobs.
you do know that being seated for long periods of time is tremendously unhealthy, right? It's also a stressful environment with a lot of unhealthy road food options. I don't imagine truckers living a very healthy lifestyle, but that could just be my own internal biases showing.
So is smoking, but I wouldn't call it physically demanding.
Can we be literate here? Smoking might not increase one's physique like physical labor -- but it still puts demands on your lungs, heart, and the rest of your body. The same thing goes with sitting for prolonged periods of time.
On the same note, the people in Mr. Beast's videos who had to keep their hand touching something for as long as possible (1 million dollars, or a sports car, etc.) literally have to sign waivers because of the bodily harm that kind of "hahaha" stuff can cause if an individual pushes it too far.
On the same note, the people in Mr. Beast's videos who had to keep their hand touching something for as long as possible (1 million dollars, or a sports car, etc.) literally have to sign waivers because of the bodily harm that kind of "hahaha" stuff can cause if an individual pushes it too far.
By this definition, where either sitting or exercising or breathing is demanding, what is not demanding?
I think unhealthy or uncomfortable would have been a better choice of words.
I think unhealthy or uncomfortable would have been a better choice of words.
I googled "Is truck driving physically demanding" and the overwhelming consensus by industry writers is, yes, it is demanding physically. I stand by my original statement and invite you to read the concerns yourself:
https://www.google.com/search?q=is+truck+driving+physically+...
https://www.google.com/search?q=is+truck+driving+physically+...
https://youtu.be/We3qupd8134?t=215
Perhaps you should listen to a trucker instead of an industry writer (as a bonus he's very entertaining and a pretty good video editor to boot). Trucking is a terrible job for a multitude of reasons and we should be very thankful to those who do it. Some of the jobs can be physically demanding, but overall it's known as a very sedentary job and the type of trucking that Walmart does is in that category.
Perhaps you should listen to a trucker instead of an industry writer (as a bonus he's very entertaining and a pretty good video editor to boot). Trucking is a terrible job for a multitude of reasons and we should be very thankful to those who do it. Some of the jobs can be physically demanding, but overall it's known as a very sedentary job and the type of trucking that Walmart does is in that category.
sure, I'll check it out.
You got me there.
I'd say it's both mentally and physically exhausting. If I drive for more than a few hours, I'm spent both mentally and physically, as well as being sore, despite essentially sitting in place for hours.
Actually most Truckers will tell you the driving part is ok or even enjoyable, it's the time away from home, the unpaid waiting, the lack of places to park for the night (many people don't realize they live in the truck for weeks on end), poor diet, and disrespectful treatment that bother them. That said, they can mostly choose a trucking specialty that involves lots of physical activity or not. But the type of trucking that Walmart does (dry van or reefer) needs basically none.
It's an important, underappreciated, and dangerous job that I have a lot of respect for; I just don't think it's generally physically demanding is all.
It's an important, underappreciated, and dangerous job that I have a lot of respect for; I just don't think it's generally physically demanding is all.
Depending on what and how far a trucker hauls, the national median salaries range from as little as $40,000 to more than $264,000,
I checked the source for that and it seems in all areas the $264k is from "Big Ass Freight and its just one number. Thats not a median salary. Actually presenting the median salaries for different distances traveled would be way more useful...
I checked the source for that and it seems in all areas the $264k is from "Big Ass Freight and its just one number. Thats not a median salary. Actually presenting the median salaries for different distances traveled would be way more useful...
I worked for a startup that sourced truckers for a while. Yeah that $264k number is completely unrealistic. It’s like saying that custodians can make $200k a year because there is some insane hazardous materials custodian job at a lab in the arctic.
They also probably got it by taking something like peak monthly earning for an ice road driver and extrapolating without accounting for seasonality and expenses (or only partially accounting for them).
They also probably got it by taking something like peak monthly earning for an ice road driver and extrapolating without accounting for seasonality and expenses (or only partially accounting for them).
BART cleaning arguably involves insanely hazardous materials- https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/bart-janitor-made-270k...
Police officers in Oakland make $650k. It is absolutely insane.
ONE police officer collected close to $600k total, if you include massive overtime and non-cash benefits including pension contributions and health and other benefits. The truth is that almost everyone else made much less. https://www.kqed.org/news/11873608/dozens-of-oakland-police-... for the details.
Oakland also suffers from a massive supply shortage and working there carries a high risk premium, so it’s not surprising that they have to offer higher salaries to experienced law enforcement officers. Basic law of economics still holds.
Oakland also suffers from a massive supply shortage and working there carries a high risk premium, so it’s not surprising that they have to offer higher salaries to experienced law enforcement officers. Basic law of economics still holds.
Bureau of Labor Statistics reports[1] the national median pay was $47,130 in 2020 for the profession.
[1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/transportation-and-material-moving/h...
[1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/transportation-and-material-moving/h...
Specialty, hazmat, oversized loads are the higher-paying jobs. Drivers need more training, experience, and licensing, that is why they command higher pay.
Yeah, the pay for truckers qualified to move spent nuclear reactors for Uncle Sam is a bit higher than those qualified to move plastic crap for Sam Walton.
Walmart requires their drivers to have a hazardous materials endorsement.
If that Wall Street Journal documentary about supply chains on YouTube is anything to go by, I expect this to continue to rise.
Good. Nice to see blue collar jobs offer a decent living.
I wonder if the future of trucking might not be immense trucks. Those, after all, are designed to maximize how much 1 driver can handle. With no driver, you wouldn’t benefit quite as much from a huge payload. 10 small trucks might be better than 1 18 wheeler.
[deleted]
Whoa, it kinda makes me wanna stop being an IT worker, drop everything and go drive trucks for Walmart. That's over 4x what I make in a year.
You, my friend, are grossly underpaid.
Time to start job shopping.
Time to start job shopping.
> “I have nothing against investment bankers. They could all retire and nothing much would change. [Truckers] all quit, everything comes to a halt,” President Joe Biden said this week at a White House event...
I don't agree with the president on much, but I share this sentiment.
I don't agree with the president on much, but I share this sentiment.
He could say the same about himself.
If he doesn’t want investment bankers, maybe he needs to help overhaul the laws to simplify capital raising, M&A, etc.
If he doesn’t want investment bankers, maybe he needs to help overhaul the laws to simplify capital raising, M&A, etc.
It's nonsense of course, if investment bankers were unnecessary, they woudn't have jobs.
> It's nonsense of course, if investment bankers were unnecessary, they woudn't have jobs.
By this logic, con artists are necessary.
By this logic, con artists are necessary.
Of a short time horizon, he's absolutely right though.
If investment bankers all went on strike for a month, civilization would carry on. If all truck drivers went on strike for a month, it'd be a catastrophe.
If investment bankers all went on strike for a month, civilization would carry on. If all truck drivers went on strike for a month, it'd be a catastrophe.
No one needs luxury goods, yet jobs exist to make them.
Jobs exist because there is demand, not necessarily a necessity.
Jobs exist because there is demand, not necessarily a necessity.
Humans have shown that they are capable of surviving in isolation, so there is no job – here to mean work done for someone else – that is a necessity as you have used it. In this context, necessity and demand are equivalent.
You both have just arrived at the rub:
Capitalism has fooled the common man into thinking that desire is necessity.
Capitalism has fooled the common man into thinking that desire is necessity.
That's not the case. Rather, the definition of "necessity" changes in this particular context. It turns out that words can have more than one meaning.
The invisible hand does not deal with parasitism efficiently. Investment bankers may be necessary but the return they get from their work says less about the value of their services than it says about the demand for their services by entities that are willing to pay.
Investment analysis is a real job, but 90% of IB is wheeling and dealing, often kickstarted by your parents getting you a plum job.
counter point: real estate agents
The rise of self driving technology seems to be coming at a very convenient time.
For example: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/06/aurora-aur-werner-enterprise...
For example: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/06/aurora-aur-werner-enterprise...
I can't help but feel like the "software industry" is in a slow decline (or race to the bottom). Back in 2007 before I even knew how to "program", I was a linux admin at a small start up. We found someone that we trusted enough to build us a basic webpage. But he wanted $75 per hour. Couldn't find anyone else so bit the bullet. It was written in php, took the guy a few weeks to do, and we paid him somewhere between $3k and $5k for the work. For the other side of our business (our actual product, taking GPS coordinates via SMS and displaying on top of a google maps like interface), same thing, we could only find one other person that we actually trusted to build our actual product. But he wanted $75 an hour. We bit the bullet. Two weeks go by and and he shows us a mostly working demo. A back end Ruby script writing the SMS to a mysql DB, and a Rails app displaying the coordinates with mapnik. Another week later and he is finished and invoices us for $16,000.
I was in college at the time and couldn't wait to graduate and start rolling in money. I mean, these two programmers didn't even have degrees and I was about to have one. That meant I could do the same thing only charge $100 an hour right?
My first "IT" job out of college I made $54k a year. After three years I got my first promotion to $64k but quit a few months later. Did a couple of 1099 contracts at $50 an hour over a year. Got hired by Apex and sent to AT&T for $35 an hour. Did that for a year and then back to 1099 contracts again. This time at $55 an hour. Moving on up! After 4 years of that, quit cold turkey and figured with 10 years of experience now under my belt that I could easily find some better contracts or full time work.
22 months and 110 interviews later, still nothing.
I was in college at the time and couldn't wait to graduate and start rolling in money. I mean, these two programmers didn't even have degrees and I was about to have one. That meant I could do the same thing only charge $100 an hour right?
My first "IT" job out of college I made $54k a year. After three years I got my first promotion to $64k but quit a few months later. Did a couple of 1099 contracts at $50 an hour over a year. Got hired by Apex and sent to AT&T for $35 an hour. Did that for a year and then back to 1099 contracts again. This time at $55 an hour. Moving on up! After 4 years of that, quit cold turkey and figured with 10 years of experience now under my belt that I could easily find some better contracts or full time work.
22 months and 110 interviews later, still nothing.
I wonder how come I was lucky enough to get a high paying job at a FAANG company when other people struggle for years and do tons of interviews and got nothing. Are you stuck in a state with not many jobs? Is it because FAANG companies only hire people who went to really good schools? Maybe the commenter above is actually not very good at interviewing and doesn't realize it? Something else?
At least two FAANG companies hire from my Kroger-brand just-beyond-community-college alma mater, so I'm gonna guess that's not it.
I have dark theories about how much harder it would have been if I'd taken even a single other job and then tried to be hired in, because of how split-brained the "university hiring" and normal hiring seem to be..
I have dark theories about how much harder it would have been if I'd taken even a single other job and then tried to be hired in, because of how split-brained the "university hiring" and normal hiring seem to be..
I'm not moving, I've been working remote only since 2015. That is the biggest factor to going to a FAANG. I am near Austin, TX, there are many SaaS startups there but the dev teams are always people under the age of 30 for the most part. They live in small apartments, not married, no kids, some didn't even have a car. I'm 40 and live on 20 acres of land and even though I personally live and breath code, it is clear I would never "fit" on any of the Austin teams even though I am perfectly fine being around modern yuppie types.
The last one. I went through 6 months of terrible interviewing and self reflection before I was any good. It’s a skill in itself.
How does this have anything to do with the article? Sounds like a long rant about how you can't get a job in a thriving tech industry where salaries are actually going up by a lot.
> Sounds like a long rant about how you can't get a job in a thriving tech industry where salaries are actually going up by a lot.
You say it is thriving, I say it is not. So who is correct? Every job I applied for was django development with a remote team. Once I'd get rejected, I'd keep an eye on the company's linkedin page and see who got the position instead of me. In two cases it ended up being someone much more senior than I (like 10 years experience in pure django), and in 3 other cases it was someone with less than two years of experience and who recently graduated from a coding bootcamp (and I guarantee they are paid no where near $100k). And in about 10 other cases, the linkedin page has stayed the same, so not sure if they hired anyone at all or what. But I've only really been paying attention to the pages for about 15 different companies versus the 60 or so I interviewed for.
Edit: Oh and about the wage thing... forgot to mention for many of these smaller software shops they are now doing most of their hiring out of South America. Fullstack labs, consumer affairs, just to name a few but the list goes on.
You say it is thriving, I say it is not. So who is correct? Every job I applied for was django development with a remote team. Once I'd get rejected, I'd keep an eye on the company's linkedin page and see who got the position instead of me. In two cases it ended up being someone much more senior than I (like 10 years experience in pure django), and in 3 other cases it was someone with less than two years of experience and who recently graduated from a coding bootcamp (and I guarantee they are paid no where near $100k). And in about 10 other cases, the linkedin page has stayed the same, so not sure if they hired anyone at all or what. But I've only really been paying attention to the pages for about 15 different companies versus the 60 or so I interviewed for.
Edit: Oh and about the wage thing... forgot to mention for many of these smaller software shops they are now doing most of their hiring out of South America. Fullstack labs, consumer affairs, just to name a few but the list goes on.
It is very much thriving. I started with internships at ~$40/hr in 2016, I will make $680k this year W2 (I code in C++ and Python). You should brush up on some recent tech stacks and move to Seattle or Bay Area if you're having trouble finding remote work.
This experience is a massive far cry from anything I’ve seen.
The median dev job is like 100k in the US so I don't think your experience (though unfortunate, not disputing that) is representative of the market. Salaries for experienced developers are climbing even now and there is a general shortage.
Are axios articles written by a neural network? Whatever that was was failing the Turing test.
They do a lot of articles in bullet point form. You just have to get used to it or not use Axios. I didn't have any problem seeing what they were getting at.
The second largest transport company in the country I live in, is currently looking hard at autonomous trucks.
The plan is to roll them out over the coming decade.
Source: conversations with the principal owner of the company.
The plan is to roll them out over the coming decade.
Source: conversations with the principal owner of the company.
The investment banker doesn't have to pay all the expenses involved in maintaining an 18 wheeler. That can add up to quite a bit, with a bit of bad luck.
John Oliver did a video a few days ago [1] about some of the problems that truckers face. I can see where having an employer and a fixed salary, even if it's from Walmart, might be preferable to having to deal being an independent trucker.
Among the things that independent truckers have to put up with is that if they show up to pick up or drop off a load and it isn't ready, they just have to sit there and wait, and they're not compensated for their time. If we're looking at industry practices in need of reform, that would be one.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=phieTCxQRLA
Among the things that independent truckers have to put up with is that if they show up to pick up or drop off a load and it isn't ready, they just have to sit there and wait, and they're not compensated for their time. If we're looking at industry practices in need of reform, that would be one.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=phieTCxQRLA
There's also the driver being liable for the safety of the trailer they pick up, even though they've never seen it before they get to the yard, and the other parties (who are not liable) have every incentive to pressure the driver to just pull aged, unsafe equipment.
Another discussion recently RE: issues with trucking coming from someone w/ experience in the industry that I thought was insightful (unironically covering main talking points of Oliver's segment)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30813331
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30813331
It is much the same in any industry that's a mix of independents and salaried folk. I write code for a living, and genuinely would not want to freelance or work short contracts. OTOH some associates I respect wouldn't want it any other way.
Reforming would also improve our supply chain efficiency
Just putting a rail line between the port of long beach and the warehouse where everything is delivered to would tremendously help things.
That rail line would need to go through a union and that would be complicated.
Probably cheaper to build a port from scratch in Baha and build a rail line to there than fight that fight.
Probably cheaper to build a port from scratch in Baha and build a rail line to there than fight that fight.
It's called inflation
As a researcher at the University in Belgium I made 2k per month.
Well, since this topic popped into my front page this also just happened locally to me:
"Amazon tractor-trailer crashed into five other vehicles on the Thruway"
https://www.timesunion.com/news/article/thruway-crash-albany...
"Amazon tractor-trailer crashed into five other vehicles on the Thruway"
https://www.timesunion.com/news/article/thruway-crash-albany...
I'm picturing in my head a tractor-trailer driving itself, if I were to take the headline at its literal phrasing with no mention of any involved drivers.
EDIT: Journalists should be upholding a certain amount of integrity when reporting facts.
Assigning agency to vehicles who can not make decisions is not what I have in my mind concerning journalistic integrity. You people like to downvote things when it conflicts with your view of the world so please continue to inflict downvotes upon me in exchange for the cognitive dissonance I've inflicted upon you. I'm used to it by now. The truck did not crash itself into five vehicles, an operator did.
EDIT: Journalists should be upholding a certain amount of integrity when reporting facts.
Assigning agency to vehicles who can not make decisions is not what I have in my mind concerning journalistic integrity. You people like to downvote things when it conflicts with your view of the world so please continue to inflict downvotes upon me in exchange for the cognitive dissonance I've inflicted upon you. I'm used to it by now. The truck did not crash itself into five vehicles, an operator did.
“crashed into” is different from “crashed itself into”
It's better than calling them "accidents" as a result of non-accidental negligence.
Tractor trailers crashes happen every day? What does this have to do with the story?
That’s just going to be a lot of 1 star reviews for late delivery.
that's just one truck- they dealt with a lot more during the blm riots
On the other hand, I think long haul trucking will be one of, if not the first job to be 100% replaced by self-driving vehicles. Trucking is limited almost entirely by the driver. Endurance (practically, but also legally) and stops for bathroom/food/gas, stops to sleep, etc. A self driving truck can go nonstop (gas/battery stops notwithstanding) for 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Interstates and major highways will be the first roads that we see lots of automated driving on, as it's the easiest type of driving (no cross traffic, pedestrians, traffic lights, etC) and easy to map. I think there may always be a demand for highly skilled truck drivers (oversize and dangerous loads, navigating tight streets in the "last mile" of delivery, etc) but the folks pulling loads from oceanside ports to Walmart warehouses in the middle of the country are probably are among the first to get replaced.
It's also absolutey awful for your health. Full working days of sitting - you could say the same for office workers, but they have the ability to stand and stretch or go on small walks (eg to get water/coffee/bathroom break) as often as they need. Horrible food options on the road - mainly fast food and drinks full of sugar and caffeine. Little to no means to exercise. Hard to have a family or establish roots.
So yeah, in the short term you could make some good money, but I just don't see it as a long term career for a multitude of reasons.