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So when i was younger i never considered sanitation work. However, as i've grown up, i kinda envy those dudes (and ladies). Get to be outside, ride on the side of a truck, dick around with your co-workers when on a route. (also if you're city employed, prob union, benefits, and pension.)
Is the job as good as i'm imagining it?
If you're built for that type of work, im sure its great. I'm sure a strong stomach, and/or weak sense of smell would help. And until we start producing way less waste, or find a way to manage it ourselves, they do provide an invaluable service. Fuck people who try to shit on blue collar/infrastructure types of jobs. Literally everyone's expected quality of life relies on people doing those tasks, and most of them require some degree of specialized training/knowledge that goes way above what an average person would even consider necessary.
This isn't specific to sanitation workers, but there's such a fucked dichotomy in the way we view "skilled" vs "unskilled" labor in the USA. Sanitation workers are so much more important and create more value than the average white collar or managerial worker, and the work is magnitudes harder.
I have arguments with my in-laws about the minimum wage because they believe minimum wage jobs are for "high school kids" or "people who need something to do". Go work a shift at mcdonalds for minimum wage and tell me about how unskilled it is...
I appreciate the solidarity y’all.
I’ve been a trash man. I worked the winter in Fort Wayne, IN and the summers throughout the South, but mostly TN, AL, TX, and KY. I drove front load, side load and rear load, and rode on the back of the truck. The summer of 2020 I drove a trash truck from Del Rio, TX to Fort Wayne, IN. The cab of the truck gets really hot because inside is an auxiliary motor called a PTO that powers the lift arm and the packing mechanism. The majority of the trucks don’t have a functioning AC. If there are no spare trucks, it could be weeks before you get your AC/Heater repaired because the trash doesn’t stop and a truck can’t be downed and potentially miss 1000+ cans for a reason other than safety or a DOT violation.
The packing mechanism is also prone to malfunctioning. At the end of my time as a garbage man, the packing mechanism on my truck malfunctioned and I had to move about 1.5 tons of trash by hand and shovel. After being delayed about four hours I grabbed a pile of trash that the shovel couldn’t get and a dirty syringe stabbed my hand.
It’s not easy, or glamorous, but it’s rewarding as all hell and builds character.
I left the trash world behind, now I service and clean portapotties and septic tanks. More dirty jobs and thankless work, but it’s job security.