I delivered a load of clothes to a department store in Sheboygan, Wisconsin the other day at 6 AM. I had driven until 2 in the morning to get there and I was very grateful when the dock worker let me sleep with my truck in the dock after I was unloaded because I didn’t think there was a close place to park and I was dead tired.
At about noon I awoke and called dispatch. They said that they would not have a load for me until 8 AM the following day. So I pulled the truck out of the dock thinking that I would head toward the direction where the load was coming from and try to find a truck stop along the way. When I got to the intersection of the interstate I saw a small truck stop on the other side of it that I had not noticed the night before when I pulled into the department store lot. I went to the truck stop and parked the truck.
There was a restaurant right beside the truck stop and I decided I would go over there to have something to eat. The place was almost deserted. There was an older couple there in the non-smoking section and a young man back in the smoking section. A host asked for my seating preference and I told him smoking. He then escorted me to a table across the aisle from the young man. A waitress came to get my order. When she was done the young man across the aisle started speaking to me. I’ll call him Ronny.
“Do you know what time it is?” Ronny asked.
“It’s right around noon,” I said.
“Thanks,” he said, “Do you come here often?”
“No, this is the first time I’ve been here. I’m from out of town.”
“Really? What do you do for a living?”
“I’m a trucker. I delivered at that department store right across the freeway this morning.”
“Does that pay good?”
“It’s decent,” I said not wanting that part of the conversation to go any further.
“I’m a professional waiter,” he said.
“Do you work here?”
“No, but I’m trying to get a job here.”
A few minutes later the waitress, I’ll call her Darla, came back with my food and to fill Ronny’s glass. He asked her if the manager was in and she said no. He then told her that he had put in an application earlier but had put the wrong date on it and wanted to fill out a new one. She fetched him another application.
While Ronny and Darla were talking another waitress came into the room and started sweeping the floor. She then heard Ronny and Darla talking about jobs and joined in the conversation. I’ll call her Rose.
Rose spoke of her time down in Florida. She had a job waiting tables down there and said she made very good money. She had a nice apartment and a nice car down there. We all wanted to know why she decided to move back to Wisconsin as she was originally from there. She said that she had lost everything in the Katrina hurricane. She had to move back up here with her folks. She was new to the restaurant and they wouldn’t let her wait tables yet because she was in training. She said that she had a second job, but she was still not able to get on her feet yet. She had been in Sheboygan four months and was still not able to get her own place.
Then the topic turned to wages. Ronny said he made $3 an hour plus tips at his current job.
“Why do you want to switch jobs then?’ Darla asked, “I only make $2.33 an hour here.”
“I only average about $18 in tips a night at my current employer.”
I decided I would chime in, “Man, that ain’t right. I think they should at least have to pay you guys minimum wage.”
Ronny and Darla looked at me like I had sprouted a third eye on my forehead.
“Minimum wage is $2.15 an hour for waitresses,” Darla said.
Rose clarified, “Minimum wage for most people is 5 or 6 bucks an hour.”
Then all three of them looked at me like I was some kind of weirdo.
Rose was in her 30s I guess. She spoke of having a teenaged girl. Darla appeared to be about the same age. Ronny looked to be in his early 20s. I was thinking that these people weren’t going anywhere in life. I need to gross about 40k a year just for my house, food, clothes, and a modest S-10 pickup. I have no idea how people survive on less money than that. My house is only a two bedroom deal that’s about 700 square feet and I don’t have to support anyone but myself.
Then I did a little digging and found that the median, national, annual wage is $13.98 per hour. That means that half of the people who work in this country make less than 30k a year.
http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_00Al.htmI’m Tobin and I drive a truck for a living. Apparently I’m one of the wealthy elite. Pleased to meet you.
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