This will piss a few people off... Why our food is so expensive...

[TruckDriver]

A driver friend of mine, that works also for the same company I do, posted this , this morning on Facebook.

"Want to know why your grocery bill is getting bigger, I just delivered four pallets to a grocery warehouse and they charged me 60 dollars to take the pallets off my trailer plus the cost of fuel to get the load there. Soon a bag of peanuts will cost us 10 bucks!!!!!"

This was "At Certco a division of Shurefine"

[Budnicks]

what's up with that stuff, why would they charge extra for that ?? 

[JB400]

what's up with that stuff, why would they charge extra for that ?? 

Because they can.

[stripedelete]

Sounds like they are saying, "it's not my job".

[charger Downunder]

Some trucks take there own fork lift with them.

[TruckDriver]

Some trucks take there own fork lift with them.

They do that here too, but it's just usually the local trucks, and only a handfull of cross country trucks.

[Tilar]

Charging to unload a trailer has been around a long time, and it's not just groceries, It's everything. You can also deal with them on prices. If they think you're going to unload your own trailer, that price will drop.

[Todd Wilson]

Are Lumpers still around?   I am at a few different salt plants daily with my job and find it hard to believe the fat slobs wearing flip flops and cut off sweat pants and T shirts that drive the trucks would do much unloading of trucks.

In the old skool days of trucking the trucker did a lot of loading/unloading by himself. It was a tough job in the old days. Tough just to drive the truck without the added work.


Todd

[71green go]

For liability reasons...Drivers NEVER unload their stuff at my company .......most of them dont give a dam how they handle the freight just to get it off.....and as was mentioned cannot believe how many drivers arrive without proper footwear etc....
Most get upset when I ask them to change their sandals and put on safety boots

[TruckDriver]

Lumpers are still around Todd. But I guess you can pay around $60 to $100 a peice for unloading now. Used to be $30 or $40 when I was still driving cross country.

[charger Downunder]

With all the goods today it should be in the receivers interest to get the truck unloaded quickly to free up the loading bay.

[redmist]

I think food prices are going up, because we are burning all our food.

The Amber waves of fuel!!!

[JB400]

I think food prices are going up, because we are burning all our food.

The Amber waves of fuel!!!

We produce more corn than we can use here in the US. 

http://agron-www.agron.iastate.edu/Courses/agron212/Readings/Corn_history.htm

Uses of Corn
During the mid 1960s, about 75 percent of the corn was fed to livestock, 13 percent was exported, and the remainder went into human food and industrial products. By 2000, the relative amount of corn fed to livestock had decreased to 60 percent, 22 percent was exported, 6 percent was used for High-Fructose Corn Sweetener, 6 percent was processed for ethanol, and 6 percent went into other products.

Between 90 and 95 percent of the crop is harvested for grain; the remaining 5 to 10 percent is grown for silage. Of the corn fed to livestock in 1960, about 40 percent went to hogs, 20 percent to poultry, 30 percent to cattle on feed and milk cows, and 10 percent to other types of livestock. By 2000, these amounts had shifted to 29 percent to cattle on feed, 29 percent to poultry, 24 percent to hogs, 16 percent to dairy cattle, and 2 percent to other types of livestock.

One reference lists over 500 different uses for corn. Corn is a component of canned corn, baby food, hominy, mush, puddings, tamales, and many more human foods.

Some industrial uses of corn include filler for plastics, packing materials, insulating materials, adhesives, chemicals, explosives, paint, paste, abrasives, dyes, insecticides, pharmaceuticals, organic acids, solvents, rayon, antifreeze, soaps, and many more.

Corn also is used as the major study plant for many academic disciplines such as genetics, physiology, soil fertility and biochemistry. It is doubtful that any other plant has been studied as extensively as has the corn plant.

A bushel of shelled corn weighs 56 pounds