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comment by kleinbl00
kleinbl00  ·  2360 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: End of the Road: Will automation put an end to the American Trucker?

I'd say every 5th Lyft driver I ride with is a former long-haul or short-haul trucker. I think that speaks volumes about the costs-benefits analysis on driving a truck.

Worthy of note - I have twice had truckers try to kill me. "Rage" (road or otherwise) never entered into it. In neither case did I ever so much as enter their lanes. I simply passed them, then found them attempting to run me over or run me off the road. One literally crossed three lanes of traffic so he could put me on the shoulder, and then try to push me into the dirt. This works because they can say "gee, officer, I didn't see him, you know, motorcycles, so small! And so zippy-aroundy! I guess what they say is true - they're 'murdercycles!' yuk yuk yuk!"

Not saying all truckers are murderous psychopaths. But I've encountered enough that I cheer their profession's extinction.





veen  ·  2360 days ago  ·  link  ·  

From this ol' Cracked article that I remembered:

    "That means that, statistically speaking, every driver you see is both new to the job and about to quit."

Recent statistics are still at 90%. Yeah, when an industry has a higher turnover than burger flipping and three-week diploma mills and with much higher problems when people fuck up, I am also squarely in the camp of automating that. Maybe promoting the drivers to 'computer monitoring agents', drive vehicles 24/7 in shifts and make everyone happier.

kleinbl00  ·  2359 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I have interviewed or interacted with three truck drivers (above and beyond the dozen or so refugees on Lyft). They were all economic washouts with no career prospects elsewhere. The most successful of them purchased his own truck, and that worked for a while. The problem was, when you're competing against big firms who claw back their margins by treating their drivers inhumanely, your choice is to treat yourself inhumanely or go out of business.

Which is what he did.

user-inactivated  ·  2360 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Actually, they don't need to be angry for it to be considered Road Rage. It just has to be unsafe behavior directed towards another motorist. The fact that stresses of driving and road rage are directly linked, it wouldn't surprise me if professional drivers engage in the behavior more often.