Right now for a journeyman tree guy its 37.60 on the check, 7.70 for healthcare, and 14.02 in a pension. So on a 40 hour week you would be making 40 x 37.60 = 1504 minus taxes and union dues. And that's hourly. So if they are 35 an hour, healthcare and a 401 it might be in the ballpark. The supplemental unemployment is an extra hourly rate set aside into a savings account so when you are laid off you have extra money set aside without you having to do anything. Helps the drunks out lol.
Business owners, do you expect a potential employee to negotiate pay?
- Thread starter Kabir424
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lumberjack
Young man on the go
How many card carrying tree dudes has everyone met?
I’m at 0.
I’m at 0.
kevin bingham
TreeHouser
- Joined
- Nov 10, 2010
- Messages
- 4,788
most of the line workers here are union, but its a right to work state now. well see how it holds up.
Nutball
TreeHouser
If they think you are too expensive, you could try talking them into seeing how you work for a day or a couple weeks.
stikine
Treehouser
Interesting rates you posted Kyle. So much of the hourly rate cost seems so dependent on what the local market will bear ie. how well off the local communities are, cost of living, etc. Up here I know a thing about cost of living! I have a couple of friends who do arb tree work here locally and last I knew they charged $50/hr. It's been a few years so they probably charge more now since it is only a part time gig (can't make a living doing it here full time because it isn't full time). Local aluminum boat fabricating business charges $90/hr, so does the Mercury & Yamaha outboard dealer. Obviously, the employee doing the work isn't getting paid that much but it just goes to show how all over the board these rates are.
Exactly. There's different expectations/ ways of doing things in different parts of the country. Out east in large population centers, in certain places in the Midwest, and in certain places out west union construction is almost mandatory. This carries over to utility work, and sometimes even to landscaping and tree work. Mass is one of those areas, and so any company doing work in that area will have to compete with that to find decent workers, which you clearly are. Boston is actually so pro union that the very pro union band Dropkick Murphys is played at sports games like the hometown heros they are. This is a different way of life than other parts of the country, but that's how it is there, and any company hiring someone of your qualifications will be pretty much forced to pay a competitive rate. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if joining the laborers was a condition of employment at some businesses, which would be a wonderful thing for you and your family imo.
vharrison
Island Girl
Kyle, thank you for your perspective and the union rate grafix. Frankie, I was just curious if you had any experience with payroll.
i‘m sure Kabir knows those rates would not fly in Alabama. Again, just Know what you are worth and be willing to negotiate for it..
i‘m sure Kabir knows those rates would not fly in Alabama. Again, just Know what you are worth and be willing to negotiate for it..
vharrison
Island Girl
Frankie, working for an hour with ported saws to buck a stump might be worth $65 an hour. That is what I would pay you for it and thank you for your time. You would not get paid $15 to sit on the back of the truck and enjoy the fresh air. Too much left on the job to do for that. We want people that work as a team and be proud to work together to get the whole job done.
SeanKroll
Treehouser
Working for the government, in a union, I didn't get that compensation. Hazardous trees galore (2 days out of 2.25 years, I felled healthy trees for road-widening), CDL, MS200t in a bucket to 880 on a springboard....
(one ellipsis, one period)
(one ellipsis, one period)
How long ago though? Inflation is a SOB. I'm probably making at least double what I'd have made when I started this career(surveying), but I can't buy any more than I could aside from things being cheaper due to being made by robots in China.
SeanKroll
Treehouser
8 years
It depends where you are too. The scale out there for me is way higher too, roughly another 25 an hour. High cost of living = way higher wages. Hell Chicago is quite substantially higher than here as well, and it's only 3 hours away. That was my point, a wage that seems out of this world for most people is normal there, but his rent is probably 5 to 8 times my house payment.
vharrison
Island Girl
Kyle, can you explain how your unemployment works? I don’t think I understand it. In Florida, the employer pays into a fund that the government controls if an employee is laid off.
Yup, same here. It's required up here for a bunch of stuff, and the employer pays that as part of his taxes. Then as a worker you apply when you are laid off. In construction they usually lay you off at the end of every job, so you go in and out of unemployment so much it's funny. You have to report all hours you work in a year, so it's like doing your taxes online everytime you work for a big stretch, often with multiple employers, in different states lol.
Frankie
I Build and Run Ported Saws !
Actually the “tax” that is paid by the employer comes out of the guys salary when you cypher it all out! I’d much prefer to get the cash up front in every paycheck and dispense with the “unemployment office” altogether, especially here in the wonderful state of NY where it took me nearly 6 MONTHS to receive 6weeks of PAY. Of course a lot of perfumed asses and bureaucrats would be out of a job with the Frankie unemployment plan
vharrison
Island Girl
Thanks, so yeah, same as here. I think the part that was confusing me was being laid off so much. I can’t imagine that.
Yeah it's weird at first. The year before last i worked in 4 different states and 6 different contractors, many guys have done even more in a year. So that actually means i was laid off or quit that many times. Needless to say i hire my taxes out 
When you are working shutdowns you will work a bunch of overtime in a week or two, and then be laid off again. If you catch a preoutage, you actually get stuff ready for the big outage, where they hire a bunch of guys all at once to do stuff while a plant is shutdown. Many plants have safety/orientation training every year that you have to sit thru, and sometimes drug tests, weld tests, and similar qualification stuff before you even start working. I've been in orientation stuff for 2 weeks before starting work on pipeline jobs, it's nuts.
All of these jobs are usually offered by the hall, who has a list of who was laid off first so everyone cycles in fairly. A contractor can also request people for leadership roles and even get a few cherry picks a year if they see someone on the list they really want. If you have been laid off for awhile or simply want to work a certain job, different locals across the country will have call outs for workers, so your local here will call them and set it up so you go work there. There are jobs where they have hundreds or thousands of guys all working at the same time, so the only way to man something like that is by using the unions. If you need that many qualified trades people all at once for a month and then don't need them, it's impossible to just hire people off the street. The more specialized your skill sets the more you end up traveling, for example as a pipefitter i travel a bunch but most laborers don't travel that much because they usually have a bunch of them because it's far less specialized. Some do travel tho, especially working pipeline, windmill jobs, highway work, etc. It's a different world from your normal 9 to 5, that's for sure.
When you are working shutdowns you will work a bunch of overtime in a week or two, and then be laid off again. If you catch a preoutage, you actually get stuff ready for the big outage, where they hire a bunch of guys all at once to do stuff while a plant is shutdown. Many plants have safety/orientation training every year that you have to sit thru, and sometimes drug tests, weld tests, and similar qualification stuff before you even start working. I've been in orientation stuff for 2 weeks before starting work on pipeline jobs, it's nuts. All of these jobs are usually offered by the hall, who has a list of who was laid off first so everyone cycles in fairly. A contractor can also request people for leadership roles and even get a few cherry picks a year if they see someone on the list they really want. If you have been laid off for awhile or simply want to work a certain job, different locals across the country will have call outs for workers, so your local here will call them and set it up so you go work there. There are jobs where they have hundreds or thousands of guys all working at the same time, so the only way to man something like that is by using the unions. If you need that many qualified trades people all at once for a month and then don't need them, it's impossible to just hire people off the street. The more specialized your skill sets the more you end up traveling, for example as a pipefitter i travel a bunch but most laborers don't travel that much because they usually have a bunch of them because it's far less specialized. Some do travel tho, especially working pipeline, windmill jobs, highway work, etc. It's a different world from your normal 9 to 5, that's for sure.
lumberjack
Young man on the go
So out of 52 weeks, how many weeks a year of actually working is common?
Frankie
I Build and Run Ported Saws !
I was a plumber once ... then I sobered up
It really just depends. I've worked all year a majority of my time in, including over a decade without a single layoff. There's guys who mainly do travel work, and would rather work on the road doing big overtime jobs rather than working close to home only getting 40 hours a week. I was doing that when i was doing pipeline, the difference in pay was so substantial that i could work 6 months and make more than if i worked all year on 40s. The highest paid guys in the trades are all road warriors, working obscene hours when they're working then not working at all when they're off.
I've been off for months at a time before, it's just part of it sometimes. You should see someone's reaction to this kind of life when they work a 9 to 5 office job, they are horrified lol. The big thing is making sure to work enough hours to keep your unemployment and health insurance, which means working at least 6 months a year. Some guys like myself have a side job (my tree service) which can somewhat remove you from the market forces and the need to travel. I've known guys who had photography businesses, tree services, mowing accounts, trucking businesses, lake maintenence businesses, hunting and fishing guides, factory jobs, real estate, etc. Basically if you are a hustler you will be fine, if not this might not be a great career. That's pretty common in the trades in general.
I've been off for months at a time before, it's just part of it sometimes. You should see someone's reaction to this kind of life when they work a 9 to 5 office job, they are horrified lol. The big thing is making sure to work enough hours to keep your unemployment and health insurance, which means working at least 6 months a year. Some guys like myself have a side job (my tree service) which can somewhat remove you from the market forces and the need to travel. I've known guys who had photography businesses, tree services, mowing accounts, trucking businesses, lake maintenence businesses, hunting and fishing guides, factory jobs, real estate, etc. Basically if you are a hustler you will be fine, if not this might not be a great career. That's pretty common in the trades in general.
vharrison
Island Girl
So interesting
FJR
Treehouser
Does the union frown upon side jobs?
