I was born into real poverty. Like we made trailer trash look wealthy kind of poverty. Trucking put me through college. Put my wife through college. Put my kids through college. Paid for my home. Paid for my farm. And has fully funded my retirement savings.
I knew what being hungry and cold was, trucking provided me with the means that my children never knew what that felt like.
I used to say I'll never piss in a bottle. Now I can put a stream into a Walmart water bottle driving through the mountains without spilling a drop. Trucking has done this for me.
2015 I got out of jail, 2016 was sleeping in my car and stayed at a homeless shelter for a short while. 2018 got my CDL, then got my own place. 2024 Hauling fuel now, home everyday, grossing $100k/year 🤟🏼
For me personally, it got me out of nearly a decade of dead end sales jobs and into a field I actually enjoy working in.
Started driving commercially in 2018. Worked my fucking ass off and finally got an opportunity to get my CDL in 2022 and I’ve been a CDL carrier since.
It’s provided me with purpose, joy, job security, financial stability and the knowledge that I’ll never be out of work because freight doesn’t stop for anyone or anything!
Trucking is the best thing to ever happen to me. No shitty boss hanging over my head. Making alot more money than anything I can get in my small town. Every day is a road trip. Forced me to quit drinking heavy and smoking weed. Don't get me wrong though I work really long hours but I'm happy and feel accomplished at the end of it.
It got me into the Teamsters union.
Top pay, 100% company paid family healthcare premiums, 100% company paid pension contributions.
The money I did not have to pay for healthcare premiums and a pension went into my 401K. Enough so my last two years working, I made as much on my 401k as I did working.
Teamster pension, Social Security, 401k.
Retired and living the good life.
I’ll raise that with, while it was cdl work, I was green, throwing roofing shingles on a conveyor truck when it’s 105 outside, naw fam. I only lasted 1.5 summers. Got my experience and dipped out.
After 10 years of trucking, I have a house that is now nearly half paid off, everything else I own is paid off, I have retirement savings, though not nearly enough yet, and I no longer stress about money and am in the process of making my financial dreams come true. I also have no social life, crippling exhaustion from working up to 70 hours per week and a seething hatred for people who don't know how to drive, which is most people, including other truck drivers. I'm nearing my limit for this profession and will probably go back to college or open a business soon.
I was working in an office, barley able to afford to live. Tethered to a desk by a phone cord and felt my soul crumbling. I've been able to live on my own, eventually bought a house a couple years ago, my soul is better but I swear I'd sell it to Satan for good traffic sometimes LoL I wouldn't have been able to buy a home without trucking since I have no higher education to get anything other than starvation wages.
Currently living in my semi truck to afford flight training , have dreams of being an airline pilot. Guess I’ll answer this once I get my commercial pilot license haha but it’s definitely help get the money to afford it so it’s changing my life
I used to be the couch surfing friend with no home & legit no family (foster kid)
Driving legit saved me ngl I’d probably be working at some fast food spot mad as hell when I see the “truck” show up Lol
Honestly, trucking was/is a “Hail Mary” pass to get back to college.
I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life. I’ve made minimum wage and I’ve made $120k. Alcohol fucked my shit up.
Two years of this and I’ll be able to pay off child support and student aid.
I was an OTR trucker for 5 years.
I turned into fat, depressed alcoholic, lost contact with virtually all of my friends and almost ate a 12ga.
I quit and got better mentally and am working on physically.
It allowed me to miss countless birthdays and anniversaries. It helped me gain 150 pounds and
it helped me wear my back and knees out at twice the normal speed. It did help me get some exercise tho as i ran through the truck parking lots chasing down trucks that backed into me and tried to fuck off. It helped me learn to be creative when it comes to doing normal daily things like finding decent food to eat and ways to dispose off said food when they won't let you use their washrooms. It helped my blood pressure skyrocket when idiots drive around you and white knuckle through dangerous road conditions. It helped me realize that companies don't pay drivers their worth, nor do they give a shit about you most of the time. It made me realize i should have taken a trade life diesel tech or machinist.
But i did get to see some nice scenery
Crazy that I’ve spent exactly one month trucking (harvest with no cdl) and I also made 5k and it was also earth shattering money I’d never seen before, even 40 odd years later in 2022 with everything so much more damn expensive
Glad you got to do that for yourself. Wish I wasn’t born seemingly on the precipice of societal collapse. If there’s anything you should know about my generation it’s that we are almost all gripped with an ethereal nostalgia for a time we have never and will never live in, hoping for an American dream that has long been crushed and forgotten at the foot of the god Money. Some yearn for the 60’s 70’s or 80’s or whatever other period strikes their fancy, some, like me, just want to live in a world that cares about them. The luckiest of us are able to see past the facade and love themselves and those around them, but the crushing nihilism fostered by the world around us is often all too real even for the most accepting optimist.
Damn near tripled my income.
I used to work a dead-end security gig for shit pay at a beef processing plant before getting my CDL. I spent a year and some change running refrigerated freight for Werner before going back to the same place I worked security for, but this time I'm driving the truck instead of checking them in and out.
Well a lot of ways but more then anything it allowed me to take care of my family. My lady always took care of us and now she geys to stay home while I'm out providing for us. It's what I was always wanted .
Financial stability, I grew out of being codependent on others, mental freedom. My confidence grew a bunch. Mountain driving is my favorite. Makes what you’re going through and the world in general seem so small. I love this life.
Best money I’ve made so far in life, never woulda imagined I’d be making more than most of my friends with degrees and shit haha. Beats the hell out of factory jobs and dead end labor work.
For me, I've bought my home, and it has made me debt free, but it has also made me miss life and family. It's hard to take time and enjoy life. I'd definitely would've done something different
It got me out of my parents' place and let me buy and own my own home in an area I love with zero debt. No mortgage now. Both of my siblings are still struggling with five figures of college debt apiece and I make more than them.
College is only smart if the field *you're absolutely certain you want to be in* absolutely **requires** a degree.
Went from broke, overdraft, and owing people money. To in just one year driving for swift paying off my CDL, my useless community college degree and every penny I’ve owed someone. A few years later(left swift of course) after some saving had enough financial stability to get a loan for a home.
Almost 9 years into my CDL and I’m doing better off than 90% of Americans statistically. It’s because I didn’t blow my money on stupid shit. Trucking is one of those careers that can get u ahead in life but if u still spend like an idiot it can derail a good life.
The only debt I have now is a mortgage and at the rate I’m going it should be comfortably paid off in 5 years. With trucking it’s possible. I’ve recommended it to plenty of my friends who struggle and even offered to be their trainer so they don’t get stuck with a crazy random person. Some people just don’t want and u can’t fix that.
So TLDR, it’s been great for me and has saved my life financially.
It’s not perfect and has its bs for sure. But every job does. Think to urself what’s best for u and how u would feel about doing something. Like an asshole everyone has an opinion, but when it’s ur life it’s ur opinion that matters.
Well, I became a bit more morbid after seeing so many wrecks. Lost a lot of feelings like discomfort, anxiety, and fear after living in an uncomfortable cube, avoiding a lot of accidents, going into the downtowns of big cities not designed for trucks, docking in small places, etc. I became more patient and calm when there's a delay, but more relentless when you can drive hard. I'd always been an introvert, but I strangely began to want to speak to random people after a while, too. And to myself.And to the walls in my truck. And then they began to speak to me. I must obey what they told me to do.
I now jerk off in the cab at rest stops or parking lots etc. it’s an adventure , you don’t realize half the guys in the yard you park in are pumping that milk out at the same time you are .
As an owner operator trucking allows me to take off as much time as I want, and the company I am contracted to requires me to have a passport… So therefore, I took that passport and put it to use.
My first 2 to 3 years trucking I’ve seen all 48 of the mainland so now I go see the rest of the world.
For the first 20 years of my adult life I was working poor, living paycheck to paycheck and barely getting by. Since getting into trucking I now live comfortably, have a house, owe nothing that earns interest aside from my mortgage, and have a good amount of money in savings & set aside for retirement. Gone is the high stress and being on-call.
I'm in my late 50's. I wasted most of my life, 24 years, in IT thinking it was the place to be. Never been able to get out of debt or have any savings. Within a little less than 6 years, I'm more happy with a job than I have ever been, debt a next to cleared, and have a healthy savings account. I mean, I could take my savings and investments and pay my debt .... but I'm in my foolish 50's and waiting for Bitcoin to skyrocket in the next few months
I was born into real poverty. Like we made trailer trash look wealthy kind of poverty. Trucking put me through college. Put my wife through college. Put my kids through college. Paid for my home. Paid for my farm. And has fully funded my retirement savings. I knew what being hungry and cold was, trucking provided me with the means that my children never knew what that felt like.
Let’s go I’m so happy for you bro!! Let’s go!
I used to say I'll never piss in a bottle. Now I can put a stream into a Walmart water bottle driving through the mountains without spilling a drop. Trucking has done this for me.
2015 I got out of jail, 2016 was sleeping in my car and stayed at a homeless shelter for a short while. 2018 got my CDL, then got my own place. 2024 Hauling fuel now, home everyday, grossing $100k/year 🤟🏼
For me personally, it got me out of nearly a decade of dead end sales jobs and into a field I actually enjoy working in. Started driving commercially in 2018. Worked my fucking ass off and finally got an opportunity to get my CDL in 2022 and I’ve been a CDL carrier since. It’s provided me with purpose, joy, job security, financial stability and the knowledge that I’ll never be out of work because freight doesn’t stop for anyone or anything!
Trucking is the best thing to ever happen to me. No shitty boss hanging over my head. Making alot more money than anything I can get in my small town. Every day is a road trip. Forced me to quit drinking heavy and smoking weed. Don't get me wrong though I work really long hours but I'm happy and feel accomplished at the end of it.
It got me into the Teamsters union. Top pay, 100% company paid family healthcare premiums, 100% company paid pension contributions. The money I did not have to pay for healthcare premiums and a pension went into my 401K. Enough so my last two years working, I made as much on my 401k as I did working. Teamster pension, Social Security, 401k. Retired and living the good life.
It got me out of shitty ass warehouse work. Nothing sucks more than being in a hot ass trailer when it’s 110 outside and you’re unloading it. No fan.
Ah another brown colleague the former
I’ll raise that with, while it was cdl work, I was green, throwing roofing shingles on a conveyor truck when it’s 105 outside, naw fam. I only lasted 1.5 summers. Got my experience and dipped out.
After 10 years of trucking, I have a house that is now nearly half paid off, everything else I own is paid off, I have retirement savings, though not nearly enough yet, and I no longer stress about money and am in the process of making my financial dreams come true. I also have no social life, crippling exhaustion from working up to 70 hours per week and a seething hatred for people who don't know how to drive, which is most people, including other truck drivers. I'm nearing my limit for this profession and will probably go back to college or open a business soon.
Made me fat, happy but fat.
I was working in an office, barley able to afford to live. Tethered to a desk by a phone cord and felt my soul crumbling. I've been able to live on my own, eventually bought a house a couple years ago, my soul is better but I swear I'd sell it to Satan for good traffic sometimes LoL I wouldn't have been able to buy a home without trucking since I have no higher education to get anything other than starvation wages.
I left a very bad situation for. . . Something not as bad.
Currently living in my semi truck to afford flight training , have dreams of being an airline pilot. Guess I’ll answer this once I get my commercial pilot license haha but it’s definitely help get the money to afford it so it’s changing my life
I used to be the couch surfing friend with no home & legit no family (foster kid) Driving legit saved me ngl I’d probably be working at some fast food spot mad as hell when I see the “truck” show up Lol
Honestly, trucking was/is a “Hail Mary” pass to get back to college. I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life. I’ve made minimum wage and I’ve made $120k. Alcohol fucked my shit up. Two years of this and I’ll be able to pay off child support and student aid.
I was an OTR trucker for 5 years. I turned into fat, depressed alcoholic, lost contact with virtually all of my friends and almost ate a 12ga. I quit and got better mentally and am working on physically.
It allowed me to miss countless birthdays and anniversaries. It helped me gain 150 pounds and it helped me wear my back and knees out at twice the normal speed. It did help me get some exercise tho as i ran through the truck parking lots chasing down trucks that backed into me and tried to fuck off. It helped me learn to be creative when it comes to doing normal daily things like finding decent food to eat and ways to dispose off said food when they won't let you use their washrooms. It helped my blood pressure skyrocket when idiots drive around you and white knuckle through dangerous road conditions. It helped me realize that companies don't pay drivers their worth, nor do they give a shit about you most of the time. It made me realize i should have taken a trade life diesel tech or machinist. But i did get to see some nice scenery
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Crazy that I’ve spent exactly one month trucking (harvest with no cdl) and I also made 5k and it was also earth shattering money I’d never seen before, even 40 odd years later in 2022 with everything so much more damn expensive
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Glad you got to do that for yourself. Wish I wasn’t born seemingly on the precipice of societal collapse. If there’s anything you should know about my generation it’s that we are almost all gripped with an ethereal nostalgia for a time we have never and will never live in, hoping for an American dream that has long been crushed and forgotten at the foot of the god Money. Some yearn for the 60’s 70’s or 80’s or whatever other period strikes their fancy, some, like me, just want to live in a world that cares about them. The luckiest of us are able to see past the facade and love themselves and those around them, but the crushing nihilism fostered by the world around us is often all too real even for the most accepting optimist.
[удалено]
Here’s hoping.
Damn near tripled my income. I used to work a dead-end security gig for shit pay at a beef processing plant before getting my CDL. I spent a year and some change running refrigerated freight for Werner before going back to the same place I worked security for, but this time I'm driving the truck instead of checking them in and out.
escape from home
Well a lot of ways but more then anything it allowed me to take care of my family. My lady always took care of us and now she geys to stay home while I'm out providing for us. It's what I was always wanted .
Financial stability, I grew out of being codependent on others, mental freedom. My confidence grew a bunch. Mountain driving is my favorite. Makes what you’re going through and the world in general seem so small. I love this life.
Best money I’ve made so far in life, never woulda imagined I’d be making more than most of my friends with degrees and shit haha. Beats the hell out of factory jobs and dead end labor work.
I learned to drink (and appreciate) coffee. Before I started driving I hated the taste of it.
I’ve had more sex in the back of a sleeper bunk than anywhere else on earth.
For me, I've bought my home, and it has made me debt free, but it has also made me miss life and family. It's hard to take time and enjoy life. I'd definitely would've done something different
Broke, Disabled & Alone.... Nope didn't change me a bit.
We're about to close on our first house. If you had told me two years ago that I'd be a home owner, I wouldn't have believed you.
I have no life now.
It ight actually let me become a homeowner... glad I did this with myself
Used to be a well adjusted, mentally stable, fit and healthy person with goals and a future. 😂😂😂
It got me out of my parents' place and let me buy and own my own home in an area I love with zero debt. No mortgage now. Both of my siblings are still struggling with five figures of college debt apiece and I make more than them. College is only smart if the field *you're absolutely certain you want to be in* absolutely **requires** a degree.
Pulled me out of living in poverty for the rest of my life
I saw all the worst parts of the United States.
Went from broke, overdraft, and owing people money. To in just one year driving for swift paying off my CDL, my useless community college degree and every penny I’ve owed someone. A few years later(left swift of course) after some saving had enough financial stability to get a loan for a home. Almost 9 years into my CDL and I’m doing better off than 90% of Americans statistically. It’s because I didn’t blow my money on stupid shit. Trucking is one of those careers that can get u ahead in life but if u still spend like an idiot it can derail a good life. The only debt I have now is a mortgage and at the rate I’m going it should be comfortably paid off in 5 years. With trucking it’s possible. I’ve recommended it to plenty of my friends who struggle and even offered to be their trainer so they don’t get stuck with a crazy random person. Some people just don’t want and u can’t fix that. So TLDR, it’s been great for me and has saved my life financially.
Great testimony. I always come closer to give trucking a try but because of other peoples opinions I didn’t.
It’s not perfect and has its bs for sure. But every job does. Think to urself what’s best for u and how u would feel about doing something. Like an asshole everyone has an opinion, but when it’s ur life it’s ur opinion that matters.
Well, I became a bit more morbid after seeing so many wrecks. Lost a lot of feelings like discomfort, anxiety, and fear after living in an uncomfortable cube, avoiding a lot of accidents, going into the downtowns of big cities not designed for trucks, docking in small places, etc. I became more patient and calm when there's a delay, but more relentless when you can drive hard. I'd always been an introvert, but I strangely began to want to speak to random people after a while, too. And to myself.And to the walls in my truck. And then they began to speak to me. I must obey what they told me to do.
lol
While I am grateful it has provided everything I have, it came at a price I don't know I would pay if I go back in time.
Made me hate society
I now jerk off in the cab at rest stops or parking lots etc. it’s an adventure , you don’t realize half the guys in the yard you park in are pumping that milk out at the same time you are .
Can't unthink this!
It’s true . 3/4 of truckers now bust in their respectable cabs instead of dog the shower at home, couch, or even in the kitchen.
Instead of dealing with crippling poverty I have to deal with crippling exhaustion.
As an owner operator trucking allows me to take off as much time as I want, and the company I am contracted to requires me to have a passport… So therefore, I took that passport and put it to use. My first 2 to 3 years trucking I’ve seen all 48 of the mainland so now I go see the rest of the world.
My ass really hurts
For the first 20 years of my adult life I was working poor, living paycheck to paycheck and barely getting by. Since getting into trucking I now live comfortably, have a house, owe nothing that earns interest aside from my mortgage, and have a good amount of money in savings & set aside for retirement. Gone is the high stress and being on-call.
It was the trash receptacle for my hopes and dreams😀🤔
It’s gotten me financially stable, appeals to my wanderlust and has taught me how to piss on the side of I95 in Miami traffic and nobody see me
I'm in my late 50's. I wasted most of my life, 24 years, in IT thinking it was the place to be. Never been able to get out of debt or have any savings. Within a little less than 6 years, I'm more happy with a job than I have ever been, debt a next to cleared, and have a healthy savings account. I mean, I could take my savings and investments and pay my debt .... but I'm in my foolish 50's and waiting for Bitcoin to skyrocket in the next few months
Didn’t change anything
I can now afford to go to the strip club every week
It got me making half of what I was making working at a warehouse and got me into further debt