They never did Mr 1776.
I got into the industry in a good time so to speak. I just wished that being a newbie was not so expensive in so many ways other than money.
For example, I was working out of Port East in Baltimore downtown by the Tunnel. Commute a hour one way in a old car drinking gasoline all the way there and back. I think it was 90 cents a gallon and roughly 6 gallons one way. 10 round trip. Call it 10 bucks a day just for gasoline. Meals another 20. And thats just scraping it with two particularly careful meals a day with something set aside every day against a day of battle.
I was taking in 40 dollars gross a day running 20 to 26 hour turns to and from Norfolk. Most of it consisted of waiting by a phone booth for something coming back out.
Then busted the state bear at one particular light on the highway at 80 nodding off coming home. Sleep 4 hours and go back out to do it again in a day cab. Before sunrise.
Past the same bear who would check on me. Cost me another 30 minutes. Oh well.
Took me a couple of months but half the wages went into the tank, other half went into food on the road and made maybe 100 dollars.
I simply quit. They asked if I was independently wealthy as the first question in my exit interview.
I looked around the fine office. Fine lobby with colonial era furniture for the people to get a good impression and so on. Then remembered the crappy tractors out back that no one worked on at all.
I told him no. And money does not matter when dispatch is happy to have you sit by the phone for 16 hours a day. there is no money in your company. Then i left.
I was too new and too little to be shooting off my big mouth like that. Little did I know.