@oldtimer-11 i just read that Yellow freight shut down. 33,000 out of work. That will probably mess up the supply chain more than it already was.
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Yeah, if youâre waiting for that new fender to come in, you might have to drive down to the la dock and pick it up yourself. 33,000 drivers on the street. Itâs a question where there is more corruption, in dc or the teamsters.
One can reasonably assume that the vast majority of drivers, warehouse workers, and other front-line personnel who lost their jobs in the company collapse will remain in the industry and find new employment at a competitor. And one can also reasonably assume that customers who used Yellow to transport their products will shift their business to one of its many competitors. Those competitors will find themselves needing to recruit and hire more drivers and warehouse workers, and to purchase more trucks, trailers, and equipment.
Therefore, the only real losers in the companyâs collapse will be Yellowâs investors and creditors. Of course, management deserves to suffer, but they seldom do (unfortunately).
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Businesses small and large here the SF Bay area seem to continue to have difficulty making a go of it, usually citing their customerâs continuing Covid concerns as the most important issue. Just wondering, could Covid concerns be related to this freight trucking company as well? Maybe there is less freight needing shipping b/c retail customers just arenât buying as much, donât want to spend as much time doing indoors shopping?
I havenât kept up on the current trucking situation but I think we went from a situation of needing drivers to a scramble to find loads, but I donât know. I do think it is a mistake to compare what goes on in California as an indicator of the nation as a whole. California seems to be an island. I see videos of people in panic because in and out employees donât wear masks, and the general public masked up in fear for their lives. When the rest of the country has moved on and uncovering the fraud of the whole thing. Then you have the mandate for new trucks only or electric trucks that can pick up at the docks, further causing a trucking issue there but nowhere else. And on and on.
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Supply chain? Are you still waiting for baby formula?
Yellow has been in bad shape for years, ongoing major losses.
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⊠and they took a huge federal loan in relation to the Covid crisis, most likely knowing that they lacked the resources to repay that loan.
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No, they had been in great financial diffculty for many years. They were known as the lowest cost carrier in the industry, an that situation was obviously unsustainable.
Anyone who needed baby formula at the height of the pandemic-induced shortage doesnât need it anymoreâtheir kid is old enough by now to be given real food. All joking aside, manufacturing shortages and shipping delays continue to be a problem in many industries.
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Seems to me there was an ongoing contract issue with the union involving pensions and other payments. Maybe they have been poorly managed for years, I donât know. I never dealt with trucking companies but when I did and tried to get bids, they all charged the same rate. This changed at some point with the airlines I suppose, but income may not be the whole story. Donât hear much about that other company that dropped dead. The green and red trucks with the bumper ends cut off. Suspect thereâll be a huge sale on trucks soon. Get âem while you can.
You sure about that?
It seems many drivers have been moving on from long-haul trucking lately, as the payâs not that good at the moment
Seems odd. This area has been back to normal for quite some time already. Restaurants are packed. Tourist areas and attractions are bustling with activity. There are plenty of people out and about but some things have changed as a result. Malls are much less of an attraction now, people got used to buying online and home delivery. I donât see that trend reversing.
I donât think that is the reason people are shopping less. I think the reason is that people have less money to spend. I havenât set foot in a mall in years, and the reason isnât because Iâm shopping online. Itâs because I simply donât need or want anything which is sold there. I donât like shopping for clothes, and would rather just wear what I already ownâŠand with proper care, clothes can last a long time.
Yeah again I think both are correct. As reported there are many only a $400 unexpected expense before bankruptcy and credit card bills on the upsurge. Others canât spend or donât want to spend what they have. I have brand new shoes, Jeans, cargo pants on the shelf that Iâve never worn. I prefer the ones wearing thin though. My wife asks me if Iâm really going out like that. At some point though Iâll be stopped at the door and will have to change.
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At one time, most of the trucking industry operated like a semi public utility. Freight rates were regulated by the IDD because of the carnage on the highways during the depression when truckers were not able to make enough money to keep equipment safe.
There was no competition between trucking companies on price. The rate for any commodity was set by the government and every company could only operate over specific router between cities based on their ârightsâ.
Large shippers hated this system because it cost them the same rate per hundred pounds for a truckload of widgets as a small company that only shipped a few widgets a month. Trucking companies usually lost money on the small shipments but were required to pick them up, besides they were making a profit from the large shippers and could afford to pay union drivers and still maintain safe equipment.
I donât know the reason but there was bad blood between the Kennedyâs and Jimmy Hoffa. He appointed his brother Attorney General to" get" him and formulated plans to deregulate the industry to destroy Hoffaâs union.
He did not get deregulation, but Jimmy Carter did in 1980.
With friends like the Democrats, union members donât need any enemies. Joe Biden is an exceptio0m, he did keep his campaign promise and restored multi-employer pension funds.
Union trucking companies started dropping like flies and yellow Freight is just the latest casualty.
Independent owner operators, who by law cannot unionize quickly took almost all the lucrative truckload business because they did not need the expensive terminals, loading docks and dockmen, yard jockeys and mechanics an LTL carrier does. The indepentâs thought they were going to get rick byt quickly cut each otherâs throats, taking loads returning home for just the cost of the fuel to get there.
I have lost wages, in three different trucking company bankruptcies and have W-2 forms from 50 different trucking companies. Yellow Freight was where I retired from in 19995 and current drivers were earning only 1/8 the pension per year that I was. Union rate for freight drivers in our areas were 32 cents per mile, they are only double that now and along the way we also lost our daily meal allowance.
Yellow was badly managed and miserable to work for, we were forced to work 70 every 8 days as long as we had enough hours to make a run and there was no overtime paychanging trucks, sometimes 6 times a day signing in and out, pre trip inspections and filling pit log books were not paid for and we had to give up the first hour of waiting time per tour. Also time in bed, out of town was not paid for unless it exceeded 14 hours.
A small example of the mis- management:
I was dispatched Buffalo to Cortland NY (183 miles) with a tractor to pick up two loaded trailers. When I arrived at the closed terminal, I discovered that the clerk had not put the envelopes with the freight bill of ladings in the bill box outside before he locked the terminal. I called Buffalo and the dispatcher told me to bring them back witn no bills and I refused because it was illegal. You had to have either bills of lading or a manifest to show to the police or the DOT. I suggested he call the clerk at home to come back and unlock the terminal. He refused, telling me the clerk lived an hour and a half away and told me to return with just the tractor because he was not going to pay me for sitting an hour and one half. I actually would have been paid nothing extra because I would have been paid at least a half hour minimum for hooking up the two trailers and had to give up one hour of waiting time. He then had to send a driver he could browbeat into pulling the loads back without bills.
I heard in yesterday eveningâs national news that we own 30% of yellow. We probably wonât get that back. We should be near the top of the heap on repayment since loans are senior instruments.
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Mall prices tend to be higher than at large retailers like Walmart and Target. They operate out of free standing stores and offer hybrid shopping where the customer buys in line and has the purchase brought to the car. That started during Covid and continues today. Thatâs how Mrs JT buys at Target. Couple that with straight online buying like Amazon and malls were forced out of business by stores selling similar goods at reduced prices. People can often buy the same things but at a reduced price. Since unemployment is at historically low levels I think this is more likely the case.
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+1
While Amazon isnât exactly a discount retailer, the convenience of sitting at oneâs home computer, ordering something, and having it delivered to your door a few days later certainly trumps a trip to the mall. At this point, almost all of my mall visits are simply to take a long powerwalk in air conditioned comfort.
Ironically, a few defunct malls have already been bought by Amazon so that they can do a tear-down and then build yet another distribution center/warehouse.
The trucking business knocked the railroads to their knees some decades ago, and now goods are being transported other ways, leaving the giant unified service companies in the cold. And the union contracts with the trucking companies will be blamed, but they were just a part of the changes that are destroying that way of doing things. Long haul transportation will probably move to some type of containerized shipping on automated devices that donât require people to operate them.
Things change. The little towns and villages scattered across Europe and the eastern US (and really the whole world) are mostly about as far apart as they can be and still be a one day trip for a horse and wagon. We donât use horses and wagons any more and lots of those places are withering or disappearing altogether.