There are some owner operators as described, but most are beholden.

The problem with swapping drivers has to do with hours of service requirements. A bit too much detail to get into right now, unfortunately.

I should actually correct myself slightly: Wal-Mart (and others) have some in house drivers and some outsourced.

BTW, in discussions of the transport industry, don't get distracted/lied to by the companies. Some drivers think they are owner operators, when in practice, they aren't. They will lease/buy a truck from (as an example, all of the bigs do this) Schneider. As part of the lease terms, they can only accept loads from Schneider. It should be obvious that the 'owner' is an employee who has assumed much of the risk that the company would usually take on.

ShanghaiBill has a decent reply, but he misses a point: if the automated truck is cheaper, the big companies will drive that change in a heartbeat. The trick is that someone has to be convinced that they will be cheaper. They are unlikely to automatically accept that an automated truck is safer, faster, etc. One area where they are likely to be impressed is the possibility of 24 hour operations, rather than the 10 hour per day (rough) limits of human operated trucks. In addition to (possibly) being cheaper, this will allow faster shipments for more mundane goods (there are already plenty of ways to have fast shipping, but it is cost prohibitive to do for everything) which would offer them a competitive advantage. I suspect this last point will be the thin edge of the wedge.

Most large companies outsource their transport to JB Hunt, Schneider, etc. Sure, the big letters say 'WalMart', but in smaller, DOT minimum sized font, it often has another name.

You're safe; I'm sure in our dystopian zombie future, the phones will still need sanitizing.

'Proof' (and derivatives thereof) means almost nothing when related to Pudge, no matter how tangentially. Much like 'lie' means... I don't even know what, when related to Pudge.

WTF is this shit?

The Internet, by design, is very different from the "natural monopolies" of water, sewer, etc. Because of the Internet's settlement-free peering regime (which the FCC also threatens to upend by starting to regulate peering), and because one can connect at any point and reach the others, there is no need for Internet infrastructure to be a monopoly. Our wireless ISP competes handily with cable, DSL, and all other forms of Internet service. Do you want to have a choice of providers, and be able to switch if you are not satisfied? Or do you want to be stuck with a monopoly -- one that (even worse) is run by unelected government bureaucrats and is therefore completely unaccountable to you?

There is no "muni network contract." The municipalities that petitioned the FCC want to get into the ISP business -- even outside their borders! They simply want to take over the business of broadband in and around their cities, without "bidding" on anything.

Actually, the FCC's action will have exactly the opposite effect. I own and operate a small, competitive ISP, and am quite willing to (and capable of) going up against any competitor on a level playing field. But I simply wouldn't enter any market where the city was providing service. Why? Because the city would engage in all of the following anticompetitive and predatory practices:

* The city would completely control my access to rights of way and pole attachments, and would be motivated to keep me from getting that access or make it expensive;

* I would be taxed and the taxes would be used to subsidize my competitor;

* The city would engage in horizontal monopoly leverage from its other monopoly businesses (trash, water, sewer, and in many places energy) and would enjoy cross-subsidies from them; for example, it wouldn't have to build a new billing system but could use its existing one;

* The city could also use its ability to tax, and bonding authority, to obtain capital for the buildout at bargain rates;

* The city, with its deep pockets and by expending some of that capital, could engage in predatory pricing, offering its service below cost due to taxpayer subsidies. It could do this at the outset, to take customers away, or possibly permanently;

* The city, because it provided those other services, would GET PAID more easily than I would because users wouldn't want their water, etc. cut off if they didn't pay the bill;

* The city would know when both owner-occupied and rental real estate was turning over (because of changes in the party being billed) and so could always sell to people as they moved into a new home before they would have a chance to consider my service;

* The city ISP would get the lucrative business of the city itself (eliminating one of the largest potential customers), as well as that of other government entities such as the county government and state government offices; and

* The city, under the FCC's new Title II regime, could demand franchise fees from me that it would not have to pay itself.

So, if you put yourself in the shoes of a hard working local ISP (which I am), or of a customer who wants choice, this no longer seems like such a good idea. Any ISP entering the market would have to fight an uphill battle against City Hall. So, new ISPs will not enter the market and existing broadband providers will have a strong incentive to pull out, leaving a monopoly. What is needed is FAIR, PRIVATE competition, not the unfair competition that turning unaccountable city bureaucrats loose would bring.

Most people do not have a problem with the jackboot of authority, so long as it is on their feet rather than their neck.

This is the worst crime of all.

Those Barbie thumb drives already have them. Not my fault you haven't discovered it yet.

Go work for a contractor. Get to know the feds. Then your resume magically moves to the top in usajobs.gov.

Throw me the whip and I'll throw you the idol!

We need a sampled and mixed Milhouse Nixon on that line.