When I was still working, I drove a Scion xA, and most of my commute was along country roads. It was apparently emasculating for a guy in a pickup to be trapped behind my little econobox - they’d pass me, VAROOOOOOMing loudly as if to show me my place. Then we’d meet up at the next light. 
The truckers know the limitations of their vehicles. If their governor is at 65.05 mph, and the truck ahead of them is going 65.00 mph, they can just stay behind that truck. They don’t have to take a half hour to pass that guy to gain the tiniest fraction of speed. They are not helpless, they’re choosing to make a maneuver that they know will disrupt traffic.
Me too. They are professional drivers. Whereas most of the rest of us are not.
To some extent what you may be seeing is that truck drivers are less experienced and skilled than used to be the case. Beginning with the deregulation of the industry under the Carter administration, trucks began to vastly increase in number - the number went up by 50% in the first five years - and the availability of drivers began to decline relative to the size of the carrier fleet. This started being a really, really serious shortage about 20 years ago and it’s just gotten worse; estimates range from 50,000 to 100,000 in terms of the immediate shortage of truck drivers now. (The problem in Canada, with a trucking industry very integrated into the US supply chain, is actually worse - Canada is short at least 20,000 drivers in an economy one ninth the size of the USA.)
As a result, carriers will rush drivers out of training schools and into cabs as fast as they can, and larger carriers will bring candidates in from overseas (an expensive thing, but it’s way more expensive to have trucks idle.) So you’re encountering more inexperienced drivers than used to be the case.
I think that might explain some of what I’ve been seeing where I live (Western Washington State). Truck drivers around here are pretty awful. And I don’t just mean inconsiderate (I’m not sure they’re worse than any other drivers) but when we have bad weather they are most likely to get into accidents. The last few times we had snow I’ve seen so many semis stuck. I was behind one once taking a turn on a hill and even before they started I knew that driver was going to be stuck, and sure enough they got stuck and blocked the whole intersection. I don’t think they’re assholes as the thread title suggests, I think they just aren’t very good at it.
(Note I am judging people for being bad at a profession that I have absolutely no expertise in, I’m aware of that. It’s the same way I can watch a football game and know that a player is bad even though they’re 100 times better at playing than I could ever be. The difference is that I’m not trying to be a professional truck driver.)
As far as slow passing on a hill goes:
If you drop a gear in a fully loaded truck, you just might end up doing 5 mph on the shoulder with your hazard lights on. You can’t just chase the speed down. You can’t shift fast enough. If you’re driving a big rig, following a slower truck even on a slight hill, you don’t have many options. You can run into the back of it. You can decrease your RPM’s and hope you don’t end up stopped on the side of the road trying to get going again in 1st gear. Or, you can keep your RMPs constant and go around it very slowly.
You can’t drop down to 55 to find a spot to change lanes and then speed up to 70 to pass. The diesel’s are not made for that.
This is illuminating. I’ll be more forgiving in future. Thanks for fighting my ignorance.
“Professional” is mostly meaningless in this context. I’ve seen professional drivers get their trucks stuck in railroad crossings, with the expected results. When your package never gets delivered (because it’s under a train car), thank a trucker. 
I’ve seen them trust their GPS and get stuck in a narrow city street.
Then there’s this infamous incident:
Truck drivers are just like everyone else. Mostly good with some serious dipsticks.
Watch some “bad truck driver” youtubes. Not everyone knows what they are doing.
Everybody makes mistakes. I wonder if their percentages of accidents compared to their miles driven compares favorably to the general public.
Anyone who drives mostly highway miles would have a very low accident rate. It’s not very dangerous driving (generally) and you rack up the miles pretty quick. Dense, high traffic driving with traffic coming from multiple directions is what’s really dangerous.
My experience with truckers comes primarily from driving on the 5 between southern and northern California. Every single non-commercial driver on that stretch of road at all times is both an asshole and an idiot. (Except me, of course; I’m just an asshole.) The truckers I’m mostly OK with.
Compared to cars doing the same kind of travel (i.e. highway driving), I’ll wager the accident rate is probably worse for trucks, but it’s not necessarily a reflection on the drivers. Trucks have poorer maneuverability and stopping distance than cars; good training and situational awareness can reduce how often emergency action is required by a truck driver, but it only goes so far. Then there’s the fact that car drivers sometimes do really stupid things near trucks - things they can get away with around cars, but not around trucks.
I run into this situation a lot when driving across Missouri on I-70. I understand passing on a hill is difficult for a semi. My biggest problem is that trucks seem to wait until I’m right on top of them before deciding to pull over into my lane to pass. I would think an experienced driver would be able to recognize the situation and get over early to pass, but instead it’s like they see me about to pass and decide “oops I better get over now” and cut me off.
A few years back there was a proposal to build semi-only lanes between the regular east and westbound lanes on I-70. I thought it was an interesting idea but nothing ever came of it.
If they’re doing this “for miles”, then the truck in the left lane should be ticketed. The term in Illinois for that violation is, “lingering in the left lane”, and I actually saw someone stopped for that on the way to work, and this was on a 4 lane interstate. When that occurs on a 2 lane interstate, it can back up traffic a long way and is a hazard.
In Washington State that’s potentially 2 different traffic violations.
The first is that you aren’t supposed to drive in the left-most lane on a highway unless you’re passing. That is something you’ll see on signs every now and then as a reminder. But there seems to be a lot of exceptions; on some roads you’ll see signs like “slow traffic stay right” which implies that you should stay in the left if you’re not slow. Or you’ll see “through traffic stay left”. With so many mixed messages it’s difficult to know when exactly you are supposed to stay in the right lane and when to be in the left lane. I generally am in the right lane unless traffic is bad and/or there are frequent slow drivers in the right lane (in which case technically I’m passing them all). Here’s the actual law:
https://app.leg.wa.gov/rcw/default.aspx?cite=46.61.100
I will say that I’ve never seen nor heard of that law being enforced. Supposedly it is; see this blog post talking about it:
The other law they might be breaking is about backing up traffic. It’s a minimum speed limit. Here is the law about that:
https://app.leg.wa.gov/rcw/default.aspx?cite=46.61.425
The relevant portion:
“No person shall drive a motor vehicle at such a slow speed as to impede the normal and reasonable movement of traffic except when reduced speed is necessary for safe operation or in compliance with law”
That law goes on to state that it is up to local jurisdictions and/or the Secretary of Transportation to set specific rules in areas where it is common for traffic obstructions to occur. One of the offices I support in my job is in Sequim, and there are single lane roads around that area where it specifically says if you have 5 or more vehicles backed up behind you, you are required to pull over and let them pass. That’s not a rule enforced everywhere in the state, just in specific places where it’s a known issue.
But yeah, potentially in Washington State that truck would certainly be at risk for the “don’t drive in the left lane” law.
Unfortunately, a lot of drivers translate this as:
“No one has the right to slow me down for even an instant when I’m barreling up the left lane at 85 mph, so never try to pass if you’re going any slower than that.”
Some, But in my experience, they’re pretty rare in comparison to the number of clueless douchebags tooling along at any-old-MPH in the left lane. I have even been such a clueless douchebag myself on occasion.
I’ve driven in a lot of states and while my fellow Marylanders are no slouch in this department, rural Virginians are the kings of left lane banditry. (Maybe because they have more opportunities – we don’t have as many miles of highway that lends itself to this behavior)
Yep! When I drove for CRST, my goal was to be as close to 715 miles driven per shift as possible (11 hour shifts, governed at 65 MPH); I got paid by the mile, and the 11-hour shift is mandated, so to make the most money possible, I need to travel at limit as long as possible. It literally costs the driver money to slow down.
Basically going to three lanes in each direction solves the problems with trucks that we are talking about in this thread.