[discostu]

I would not be a qualified respondant to a job for a forklift driver, I have no clue how to run those things, I've actually looked at the control area of one, they aren't just cars, there's extra levers and stuff. Just because the job is blue collar doesn't mean there aren't qualifications, just means the qualifications are more related to hand eye co-ordination than logical analysis.

[Viva Le Dissention]

Ok, that's funny and everything, but are you honestly contending that you couldn't figure it out given, say, 10 minutes? Or, at the most--a day's training? For all purposes, everyone is qualified.

[Smogger]

I see no one bothered to answer the question where I asked why are longshoreman paid so much. I'll tell you for the same reason that union steel workers, and railroad brakeman switchman make so much money.

It's because the job that they perform can be EXTREMELY DANGEROUS, and the likelyhood that they could suffer a serious injury, be killed on the job, or maim or kill someone else job is MUCH more likely than at your average white collar job.

You guys that think they are driving around forklifts at Long Beach and LA harbors haven't a clue. They are using 40-ton gantry cranes called spreaders to place containers into the hold and onto the deck of the ship. The containers are 20 or 40 ft wide. Guys are lowered onto the containers to put cones on them so that more containers can be stacked on a ship. Containers are stacked up to the heavens. If you make a mistake on this job you or someone you work with can lose their life.

This is the main reason they are paid "so much." I noticed none of you mention this in your "free market"-five-dollar an-hour-blue collar labor vs white collar jobs analogies.

BTW: I am a programmer and I would much rather sit on my ass in an air conditions office pounding out code for 80K a year then crawling around 25 above the hold of a cargo container on a crane for a 100K a year.