Our wacky government never ceases to amaze me. Did you know that you can draw social security disability and still be qualified to drive a big rig? A study last year showed that there were not just a few drivers who qualified for disability, but 563,000.
I thought truck-driving involved hard physical labor. How can someone be disabled and still do that? If a person can do that work, why is he drawing disability? I would think that as a condition of drawing disability, a commercial license would be revoked or suspended until such time as the person is deemed able to work. Why would someone who can't work need a commercial license?
Gary Hull, a trucker, is opposed to any more regulation on truckers. He says, "Do you enjoy your clothing and house? Without the truck driver you would have none of it." Perhaps he should ask the 5,300 people killed and the additional 126,000 people injured in 2006 by big rig drivers. Of course, not all of these, I'm sure, were the trucker's fault. However, a federal safety study showed that a leading cause of big rig accidents was drivers who either fell asleep at the wheel or suffered heart attacks, seizures or other impairments while driving.
It should be a simple thing -- get disability, give up your commercial license.
"Truckers health faulted in wrecks." The Dallas Morning News; July 22, 2008; p. 1A.
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