If the shelves in your grocery store have anything on them, after almost a month of “lockdown,” you can thank a truck driver. During the coronavirus crisis, they might be the most unsung heroes in the country and the world right now.
Their work is considered essential, which it is, because if they weren’t trucking, our shelter-in-place lives would not only be less comfortable, we wouldn’t even have basic necessities. Hospitals would not have the supplies they need to treat coronavirus patients or anyone else.
According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2018 there were almost 2 million truck drivers working in the US. They average about $21 per hour or around $50,000 a year. The trucking industry, in 2019, was worth $700 billion.
These drivers move over 71% of all freight in the country, and without them, the country would not be able to function. They are the reason the almost nationwide lockdown isn’t interrupting our supply chain in a crippling way. Many regulations have been lifted to help truckers get essential goods, like food and medical supplies, to go where they need to go.
According to the Sacramento Bee:
Truckers bringing medical supplies to hospitals are clearly exempt from a long list of restrictions, as are food deliveries. So are truckers carrying cattle. Livestock are a “precursor” to food, and the government is keeping the food production chain, from farm to market, open.
These truckers are vital, just as vital as medical personnel in getting the country through the coronavirus crisis and lockdown. Indeed, the hospitals are also dependent on trucking to get the essentials they need to treat the victims of the virus.
Truck drivers risk getting coronavirus
Many truck drivers fall into risk categories for the coronavirus.
From the Trucker’s Report:
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, truck drivers anywhere from two to five times as likely to experience high isk factors.
- Trucker obesity rate (69%) vs American average (31%)
- Trucker morbid obesity rate (17%) vs American average (7%)
- Truckers who regularly smoke cigarettes (51%) vs American average (10%)
- Truckers with Diabetes (14%) vs American average (7%)
- Truckers without health insurance (38%) vs American average (17%)
- Trucker average age (55 years old) vs American average (38.2 years old)
If truckers think they have coronavirus it is hard for them to get tested. It is also hard for them to get home if they are sick.
Essential services missing
In spite of their importance, truckers are finding it difficult to get essential services while they do their important work.
Truckers are facing many obstacles. More and more truck stops are closed, making it harder to fuel up and use a restroom. Many highway rest stops have also been closed, depriving truckers of safe places to rest. Some drivers have quit driving during the lockdown to avoid the virus.
So, be thankful for the truckers when you see the milk, cheese, toilet paper and everything else on the shelves at your stores.
You can meet a few of the truckers in this video below:
1,362 Responses
I truly appreciate this article.Really thank you! Will read on…
Great, thanks for sharing this article post. Really Cool.
The other day, while I was at work, my sister stole my iphone and tested to see if it can survive a 25 foot drop, just so she can be a youtube sensation. My iPad is now broken and she has 83 views. I know this is completely off topic but I had to share it with someone!|
Hi, just wanted to mention, I liked this post. It was practical. Keep on posting!|
Wow! In the end I got a web site from where I know how to really take useful facts regarding my study and knowledge.|
The other day, while I was at work, my sister stole my iPad and tested to see if it can survive a 30 foot drop, just so she can be a youtube sensation. My apple ipad is now destroyed and she has 83 views. I know this is totally off topic but I had to share it with someone!|
I have read a few excellent stuff here. Definitely value bookmarking for revisiting. I surprise how so much effort you place to make this sort of magnificent informative site.|
Stunning story there. What occurred after? Good luck!|
Do you have a spam problem on this blog; I also am a blogger, and I was wanting to know your situation; many of us have developed some nice practices and we are looking to trade methods with other folks, why not shoot me an e-mail if interested.|
hey there and thank you for your information – I’ve definitely picked up anything new from right here. I did however expertise several technical points using this website, since I experienced to reload the website lots of times previous to I could get it to load properly. I had been wondering if your web host is OK? Not that I am complaining, but sluggish loading instances times will sometimes affect your placement in google and could damage your high-quality score if advertising and marketing with Adwords. Anyway I’m adding this RSS to my email and could look out for a lot more of your respective interesting content. Make sure you update this again very soon.|
I cling on to listening to the newscast lecture about getting free online grant applications so I have been looking around for the most excellent site to get one. Could you advise me please, where could i acquire some?
This piece of writing offers clear idea in favor of the new viewers of blogging, that really how to do running a blog.|
Hey there this is kind of of off topic but I was wanting to know if blogs use WYSIWYG editors or if you have to manually code with HTML. I’m starting a blog soon but have no coding knowledge so I wanted to get advice from someone with experience. Any help would be enormously appreciated!|
I really like and appreciate your blog.Really thank you! Really Great.
Thank you ever so for you blog post.Much thanks again.
Wow! This blog looks just like my old one! It’s on a totally different subject but it has pretty much the same layout and design. Outstanding choice of colors!
Really enjoyed this blog post.Much thanks again. Fantastic.
Really informative article post.Really thank you! Really Cool.
Fantastic post. Fantastic.
Appreciate you sharing, great blog article.Really looking forward to read more. Awesome.
What you posted made a ton of sense. However, think on this, what if you typed a catchier title? I ain’t saying your information isn’t solid, but what if you added a headline to maybe grab a person’s attention? I mean BLOG_TITLE is kinda vanilla. You could peek at Yahoo’s home page and watch how they write post headlines to grab people interested. You might add a related video or a related pic or two to grab people interested about what you’ve got to say. In my opinion, it could make your blog a little livelier.|
Somebody essentially help to make seriously posts I would state. This is the very first time I frequented your website page and thus far? I amazed with the research you made to make this particular publish amazing. Magnificent job!
Very nice post. I just stumbled upon your blog and wanted to say that I have really enjoyed browsing your blog posts. After all I’ll be subscribing to your feed and I hope you write again soon!
Hi there! This article couldn’t be written much better! Reading through this article reminds me of my previous roommate! He continually kept talking about this. I am going to forward this post to him. Fairly certain he’s going to have a great read. Many thanks for sharing!|
Hi there, I found your site by means of Google even as searching for a related matter, your web site came up, it seems to be great. I have bookmarked it in my google bookmarks.
In this awesome design of things you receive a B+ just for effort. Where you confused us ended up being in your details. As as the maxim goes, the devil is in the details… And that could not be more true at this point. Having said that, allow me say to you what exactly did give good results. Your article (parts of it) is quite powerful and this is most likely why I am making the effort to opine. I do not make it a regular habit of doing that. Second, although I can easily notice the jumps in logic you make, I am definitely not convinced of how you seem to connect your details that help to make the actual conclusion. For right now I will yield to your point but hope in the near future you actually connect the dots much better.
Heya fantastic website! Does running a blog such as this take a large amount of work? I’ve no understanding of computer programming however I was hoping to start my own blog soon. Anyhow, if you have any recommendations or tips for new blog owners please share. I understand this is off topic however I just needed to ask. Thank you!|
Really informative post.Really looking forward to read more. Cool.
I’m really loving the theme/design of your blog. Do you ever run into any web browser compatibility problems? A couple of my blog readers have complained about my site not operating correctly in Explorer but looks great in Opera. Do you have any suggestions to help fix this issue?|
Thanks for sharing, this is a fantastic blog.Really thank you! Fantastic.
I am so grateful for your blog.Much thanks again. Want more.
Hello There. I discovered your weblog the usage of msn. That is an extremely neatly written article. I will make sure to bookmark it and come back to read more of your helpful info. Thanks for the post. I’ll definitely return.|
I found your blog web site on google and check a couple of of your early posts. Continue to keep up the excellent operate. I simply further up your RSS feed to my MSN News Reader. Looking for forward to reading extra from you later on!…
Excellent article! We are linking to this particularly great article on our site. Keep up the good writing.|