Justification

Today's Thoughts 1/2/12 Justification

Quite some years ago, I was working a very lucrative contract. The pay was great and the workload was very scarce at best. On a good day, we would actually find ourselves with a load and get a chance to move our trucks and that led to a change of scenery. We would get to go to some other facility and mingle with the crowd over there for a while. While on one of these trips, we found ourself just in time for a free lunch so we grabbed a plate, found us a remote corner of the lunchroom, and started to enjoy our lunch.

While sitting there with my wife, the head guy of the place walks in with the area supervisor, they grab their lunch and sit down at the table next to us. Then within ear shot of us they start having their meeting not caring much if we over heard or not. The jest of it was that if the head guy wanted to keep his job then he was going to have to fill out the proper forms to keep this place open. The higher ups wanted to close it down because as it turned out, it was no longer useful and the people that were actually using it, well they were getting paid good money on their own and were not supposed to be double dipping by drawing support from this location.

So, my wife and I sat there and listened as the area supervisor explained exactly how to fill out the paper work to keep open not only this place but all the jobs it was providing even though it was no longer needed. They sat there and justified their existence beyond anything that was for a fact, truly needed just to keep their jobs. I figure that was no problem though because yours and mine tax dollars paid for that.

Another thing that our tax dollars are paying for is the FMCSA. The questions is, is there a need for them or are they just whacking us with unneeded regulation after unneeded regulation just to justify their jobs? Let us face it, if they actually came out and told the world what we have accomplish as an industry, they would lose half of their funding. If they mentioned the fact that it might be time to sit back and see if the work that they have already accomplished has the effect that thought it would, they would lose the other have of their funding.

The way I see it, these folks at our expense have to hammer on us to justify their jobs. If even for a second they let up and the world sees what is behind the curtain, they will be unable to justify the continued onslaught of overbearing regulations that they must bring upon us to justify their jobs. They cannot for an instant let it out that they are no longer needed as much as they are trying to justify that they are needed. Trust me, to a point we need them. Can you imagine what this industry would do to us without their protection? However, at this point, they have shackled us to the point we cannot breath.

What is needed here by my opinion is a break from new regulations long enough to see what all the new regulations that they just put into effect are going to do. As it is, even if our safety numbers do improve, they have layered us with so many new regulations that no one will be able to tell which one was the one that actually did it as opposed to which one actually hindered the numbers. Then of course, they will never let it be known that the drivers themselves took the lead and made those safety numbers look good despite what the FMCSA did. No, that would never justify their existence, now would it?

I am afraid that the need for them to justify their jobs has the trucking industry by the short hairs. Moreover, it will stay this way until enough of us let them know that we have had enough. Our safety numbers look great and all that can happen by continuing to add more regulation is to bankrupt decent hard working truck driver's right out of the business.

On the other hand, to keep pouncing on us using every little news article as justification to keep their jobs only serves to demoralize the decent drivers out here on the highway. I mean really, just how many times will it take calling a good truck driver a killer truck driver before they really do not give a crap any more. Eventually, no matter how hard that driver tries, they will give up because his country will always look at him as a killer. The FMCSA needs bad numbers out there so they can justify their paychecks. Unfortunately, this works against having safe and legal truckers out on that highway.

It is time peeps to let our elected officials know that the FMCSA can no longer justify their existence off the backs of hard working Americans. We as a industry have taking the lead in highway safety from them and while we may still need them to keep the real world from forcing us out if we demand to run safe and legal, there is simply no justification to keep hammering on us to justify their paychecks.

Be safe peeps …
Jeff Head.
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