Do truckers really work 60- 70 hours a week?

yes its 70 hours in a 7 day period MAXIMUM but doesn't usually happen, and you can't have it at 40-48 hours in a 7 day period because that would only be about 6-7 hours per day which isn't enough, what you don't realize is that they have to wait to be loaded and unloaded and other little things, they can't have the same time schedule everyday because some places say you can't pick up or drop off a load until a certain time, one day you could drive a normal day from the morning into the evening but then 2 days later your stuck driving all night long while sleeping during the day, also loads have a deadline you can't take all the time you want, if you have 2 days to take it then you have 2 days to take it unless something happened like truck problems or weather (like snow and ice), so truckers have to be flexible and don't have the luxury of being able to drive when they want to, they drive when they have to, its safe to have a 70 hour work week because DOT requires 10 hours in the sleeper birth, also DOT says you only have a 14 hours period from the time you start driving to drive the 11 hours, if your 14 hours are over but only drove 7 hours then you have to pull over no matter what so they don't drive 11 hours eveyday, its another DOT rule allowing a 32 hour "restart" meaning if your close to the 70 hours you can take a 32 hour long break as "off duty" and your 10 day 70 hour week starts over, also truckers get paid by the mile not by the hour and you can't make any money driving 6-7 hours per day, reason they do it per mile and not per hour is to get loads to where they need to go, if it was per hour then most truckers would take to long to get the load to the destination which means the products you by might not be there when you need them to be

just because you can't drive more than 6 hours at a time doesn't mean they're not able to, most of them couldn't drive more than 4 hours before needing a break but after awhile you get used to it and some truckers can go the whole 11 hours without stopping unless they need to use the bathroom

all in all if you want to be able to buy products let the truckers drive as long as they safely can because EVERYTHING you own and use has been on an 18 wheeler in some time or the other rather it was the finished product or the rough materials to make a product

oh and by the way i know there's some truckers that shouldn't be driving an 18 wheeler let alone any vehicle but truckers are professional drivers so they're able to drive more and longer than a normal driver, i have no problem driving long distances, but remember there's A LOT more people driving a regular vehicle that shouldn't be driving either, i read on the NC DMV site that 2/3 of the wrecks between an 18 wheeler and regular vehicle it was the regular vehicle's fault, im not sure if that was stats in just NC or nationwide

Some do (and maybe a little more), and some don't.

But yes, 60 hours in 7 days, or 70 hours in 8 days is legal.

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What other industry has employees working a mandatory 70 hr work week! This kind of exploitation has to stop!! What about the driver's family? Sounds like only a job for young single individuals, and or people without families, hobbies or any other personal interests? Wow!

the drive time is 11 hours a day with a maximum 14 hrs on duty. when 70 hrs is reached there's a mandatory 36 hours they have to be off duty not driving so that their next 70 hrs can restart

Hours worked behind the wheel is up to 11 hours in a 24 hour period with 10 hours of rest in sleeper,up from 8 hours.

Note:drivers that are not using electronic logs can run three paper logs bypassing Fed rules of the road,these are the ones who pose the most danger.

Hi, it does seem a long time at the wheel and i would have thought not safe for the driver or other road users. The link i have posted has the hour`s in various tables

They have to , because they usually go very long distance and get paid in Cents per mile.

Yes, it happens. Yes it's unsafe. Until truckers are paid hourly instead of by the mile, it will continue.