Sikh drivers are transforming U.S. trucking | Hacker News Reader

Sikh drivers are transforming U.S. trucking

latimes.com

216 pointsssully145 comments

Fun Fact: ever wonder why they all share the same last names ?

for instance - male last names are always "SINGH" and female last names are always "KAUR"...

because their faith is hoping to create an egalitarian society..where SINGH means king/lion and KAUR means princess/queen...i don't know how well that is working out for the whole community?... but i actually do think that is a noble quest..

Source: http://investorfieldguide.com/savneet/ (for those interested--fintech podcast listen from 01:09:40)

This is one of the concepts I like the most personally. The plan was to remove discrimination as the emphasis is on an egalitarian society. It also ensures women don't change their surnames after marriage (if they are practicing Sikhs). The religion is pretty egalitarian in that respect, and there is no role the women can't take up in the religion. Since most of the Sikhs are Punjabis, and Punjabi society still isn't quite feminist, you don't get to see this as much in practice as you should. As in, I don't know of a female Head Granthi in major Gurdwaras. For context, a Granthi is a reader of the religious text, employed by the Gurdwara for daily services. Anyone can read the book though, just to be clear. Some people might use the word priest for Granthi, but that's incorrect because Sikhism doesn't have priests or bishops, as everyone is equal, and positions of power that wield influence aren't supposed to be present, as Sikhism doesn't believe special titles like priests or bishops bestow any special capabilities. I do hope that as the Punjabi society progresses (or we see more people from other ethnicities taking up these roles), we'll see more involvement of women in such roles, as the egalitarian bit and no degradation of women is something I've always liked quite a bit personally.

Thanks for sharing! This was a comprehensive perspective of current practices.

It was a noble concept, but everybody fell off the track pretty fast (this concept was started by the last Sikh Guru in 1699, a little over 300 years ago). Nowadays Singh and Kaur is mostly used as a middle name, and everybody has a last name. The last names tell you which "caste" the person is.

I am a Non-sikh Indian and totally loved this idea of same last names. In our society people judge you based on your last name (caste) and I never liked it. My son's last name is Singh.

This can't coexist all that well with the main purpose of names: To distinguish people from each other...

Rome managed hundreds of years with like 2 names and numbering their kids

Even worse they changed names entirely over their lifetimes. Looking at you one of 10 "Gaius Octavius"s. Specifically G. O. Thurinus ahem Agustus.

Not to mention two Rome's...

Well it's a bit like browser fingerprinting right? You don't need seven billion different UserAgents to distinguish users. A few features is enough to distinguish this Chrome user from another. That's especially true with small population size: all these traditions started out small.

I think Sikhs are great, they are hard-working people. But, how are they transforming the trucking industry though? It seems to me that the ethnicity of labor force in this industry has changed like how it has happened in multiple other industries at least in the USA. Earlier in the west coast, the east Asians did construction, now it's Mexicans. It seems like that is what happened in trucking- Sikhs form the labor force now for many reasons, and that is not a new trend.

The real transformation is coming soon I think and that will be with self driving trucks.

Speaking as a truck-driver (not over-the-road, I drive a septic tank truck), I find it shocking that so much is poured into the self-driving movement and not invested into changing the infrastructure to require fewer transports in the first place.

Self-driving is a win for corporations in that it saves them money in the long run, and it would offer higher throughput as the trucks could run 24/7 with no need for breaks. Refueling could happen while they're being loaded/unloaded by warehouse personnel, as could general maintenance such as changing tires etc. so you would have a small fleet of truck operating nearly continuously which would be a huge economic win for these companies.

But why isn't more money spent trying to change the transportation sector? Why are trucks running across the US instead of high-capacity trains? One train could easily swallow 50 trucks worth of goods if the infrastructure was built to accommodate it. Why are things shipped so far instead of produced and sold more locally? There's capacity to produce food much closer to where people live, so 'fresh' actually means fresh, and it travels at most double-digit miles before it hits the store instead of quadruple-digit miles or more.

By all means push for self-driving, but for the environment we need to push for no driving.

  Why are trucks running across the
  US instead of high-capacity trains?

Imagine a country where every company and family follows the rule "Make the investments that, without anyone else changing anything, will pay back my investment fastest"

To use the jargon of game theory they are unable to coordinate; when faced with a stag hunt [1] they will always choose to pursue hares alone instead of pursuing a stag as a team.

In this country, 50 families will buy £10,000 SUVs to deal with a potholed road, as any family resurfacing it alone would spend £100,000, and pooling £2,000 each isn't an option.

Likewise, a trucking company can buy an battery electric truck or a self-driving truck without anyone else changing anything - it can run on the roads that already exist.

Do you suppose such a country would ever end up with trains, or busses, or overhead power cables for electric vehicles?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stag_hunt

I know why, on a practical and political level, why things are the way they are. I'm questioning the status quo: I think policies should be implemented and government funds should be allocated such that we change the current status quo.

I am very much not a believer in the supremacy of the free market.

>I'm questioning the status quo: I think policies should be implemented and government funds should be allocated such that we change the current status quo.

Americans don't believe in this; they believe in the status quo which is not spending anything on infrastructure and letting it decay. Look at who they vote for, and the infrastructural policies they push.

> environment we need to push for no driving

Agreed, but politically it's near impossible at this point. One person expressed the effort required to change how we interact with the environment quite well: on the country-level, it's like the US mobilization for WW2. After decades of government intervention being framed as diabolic, and the issue of environment being turned into a partisan issue, I don't see any way this can happen in US at this time.

Moon shot. Arguably the right mix of political PR (charismatic leadership, cohesive message) and some sense of large enough external threat. Climate change is already right there as not just a huge external threat, but an existential threat. Politicians have just yet to mobilize the American political machinery necessary to properly react to it. A few good speeches from the right leader could do magic, at least so history tells us.

(It may not be possible in the age of Fox News to rally enough people to the smart causes. But the treasons of that Australian institution against the World are still left to be prosecuted.)

Lots of goods are shipped via train. It's very cheap. But it is slower, and you still need trucks for last mile delivery... Or in lots of cases, last 100 miles delivery.

This is in large part due to BNSF, UP and other US railways spinning off or closing all the unprofitable short rail lines that used to go to local warehouses, industrial and commercial districts, resulting in many decrepit, barely usable rail lines.

Trucks are the only option when your local rail operator shuts down or doesn't have the capacity to service your business. This chronic underinvestment in vital infrastructure is hurting the economies of smaller towns, making any business that needs cheap transport to thrive less competitive.

Not nearly enough are shipped via train, and infrastructure could be changed and improved to reduce the need for last-mile delivery (particularly, remove the need for last-100-mile deliveries).

If all we needed were short-haul last mile deliveries we'd eliminate millions of truck miles per year (huge economic and environmental win), move those trucks to green propulsion and it's even better.

This can't happen with how the infrastructure looks today though. Which is why I question the money spent on self-driving instead of fixing the whole transport sector. It's bailing water faster in a sinking boat while ignoring the gaping hole in the bottom.

Maybe the difference is that the Sikh community is much tighter knit than most immigrant communities. We're probably overlooking that the East Asian and Mexican communities that predominate in certain industries are often sub-communities that are tighter knit than they seem--e.g. Jalisco emigrants in some parts of the Bay Area--but even so I wouldn't be surprised if the Sikh community is especially close.

The tighter knit the community the more they can act deliberately to quickly and/or comprehensively achieve some goal. An obvious contemporary example are the Patel families in the hotel industry. Both the Patels and Sikhs have long-existed as distinct socio-economic groups in India. Sikhs are arguably a nation, although that cuts both ways in terms of how relatively tight-knit they may be.

Self-driving trucks may be coming but don't discount the long-tail of traditional trucking business that we'll see. Declining industries can be extremely profitable, especially with enough focus. Mustering the capital to keep investing in the best opportunities can be difficult because the future growth isn't there. Tight-knit communities are particularly well suited to exploit those opportunities precisely because of their funding networks and labor specialization.

I understand reminders as a generalized practice, but this metaphor is one I'll have to meditate on:

"Every day, he wears a silver bracelet that symbolizes a handcuff. “Remember, you are handcuffed to God. Remind yourself to not do bad things,” Pal says. It reminds him to be kind in the face of ignorance and hatred."

My knowledge of Sikh religion is pretty limited, but as I understand it, they join most other major religions in seeing the world and ordinary, secular life as full of temptation and moral danger... but unlike most major religions, they discourage retreating from the world and ordinary secular life.

This is striking since there's so much agreement on retreat-from-the-world being valuable and even laudable in other faiths. Many traditions hold ultimate enlightenment and engagement with the divine as being actually, or at least practically, impossible without it. IOW Sikhs deliberately practice their religion on hard mode. Badass.

I'm a Sikh, and that's very correct. Sikhism discourages living as a recluse or retreating from the world. You are supposed to actively participate in the society, while continuously learning how to become a better person. That's the literal meaning of the word 'Sikh' - a disciple or learner.

Protestant Christianity is the same. It doesn't preach living apart from the world.

Not entirely sure about Catholics. Orthodox have always struck me as living apart to some extent but I may be wrong and would be interested in hearing from a follower of Orthodoxy.

There are thousands of protestant sects. Just about any generalization you make about them is going to be wrong. Many of them teach that the secular world is sinful and to be avoided.

The great commission essentially makes it impossible for Christians of any denomination to say that.

I’m not saying some don’t, but doing so requires participants who don’t read the Bible on their own at all. It’s kinda like open source that way.

I do agree with you, but sadly many Christians do ignore the fact Jesus hung out with prostitutes and tax collectors, and generally mocked the "perfect" moral police (for their hypocrisy).

But individual Christians are like every other human, imperfect.

Some quick googling turned up this page, which most Evangelical Christians I know would nod along with, and many arguments from it I have heard directly from them:

https://biblereasons.com/being-set-apart/

That's talking about being set apart in behavior, not physical / social isolation.

Moderation is a pretty consistent thing throughout the Bible.

Just as an example, that page mentions "drunkenness", which is explicitly bad. At the same time, it's perfectly okay to have a glass of wine or a drink now and then as long as you're not getting drunk.

Granted that comes with some caveats, mostly boiling down to good judgement and self control. You don't want to make someone stumble, such as encouraging people to do things that they may struggle with (whether it's alcohol, meat or anything else).

"Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother or sister to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause them to fall." - 1 Corinthians 8:13

If you have a friend who wants to have a tough conversation over a beer...by all means it's the right choice to go have that beer to talk to that friend. 1 Corinthians 9:19-22 makes that pretty clear.

"Though I am free of obligation to anyone, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), to win those under the law. To those without the law I became like one without the law (though I am not outside the law of God but am under the law of Christ), to win those without the law. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all men, so that by all possible means I might save some."

There are a lot of things that people have "heard in church" or have been pushed as part of church culture that are either misunderstood or not biblical at all. There are far too many people who nod along rather than reading the Bible on their own.

I always try to drill into people, you cannot be mislead if you've read.

By far the largest denominations do not teach that.

I am sure 0.0001% of the world's 1 billion protostants like the handful of westbro baptists nut cases might believe that. You can find extremists in every religion.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) is a pretty big denomination.

On the bright side, they are gradually adopting more progressive views - black people are no longer cursed by God (as of 2013), and drinking soda is no longer forbidden (as of 2017, at least on BYU's campus). Tea and coffee are still haram, however.

The LDS Church doesn’t teach to retreat from the world but rather teaches that some of the natural tendencies of people are self destructive and should not to be indulged in.

Now to correct some of your bright side points: - The church never held as a belief that black people were cursed. There were some leaders that did not have the authority to speak authoritatively about doctrine that expressed that belief. [1] - Drinking soda has never been forbidden. You may be thinking of caffeine, though that was never explicitly forbidden but BYU did act like it was. - Tea and coffee. Yes, we avoid drinking these and also alcohol.

[1] https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topi...

"In the following year, Smith taught that the curse of Ham came from God, and that blacks were cursed with servitude.[83] He warned those who tried to interfere with slavery that God could do his own work.[84] Without reversing his opinion on the curse of Ham, Smith started expressing more anti-slavery positions starting in 1842.[85]:18[86]:18–19 After Smith's death, leaders of the LDS Church continued to teach that black Africans were under the curse of Ham and that those who tried to abolish slavery were going against the decrees of God, although the day would come when the curse would be nullified through the saving powers of Jesus Christ.[87] In addition, based on his interpretation of the Book of Abraham, Brigham Young believed that, as a result of this curse, negroes were banned from the Mormon priesthood.[88]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_Ham#Latter_Day_Saint_...

>and drinking soda is no longer forbidden (as of 2017, at least on BYU's campus). Tea and coffee are still haram, however.

Wow, that's really backwards. Tea and coffee are known to be healthy in moderation (especially green tea), while soda is basically poison and is a major contributor to making Americans fat. There's literally nothing healthy about soda.

In the mid 19th century people were becoming aware of the addictiveness of caffeine in the light of the emerging science of modern chemistry.[1] Joseph Smith took that trending concern and ran with it.

I don't know if Smith personally knew about caffeine as a specific component, but I think that was the background context--the mainstreaming of chemistry kick-started another cultural cycle of prescriptive living. The trend ultimately grew into the widely popular Clean Living movement in the latter part the 19th century, so Smith was way ahead of his time. See also Seventh Day Adventism and John Kellogg.

I don't mean to belittle the disciplines of the LDS church by putting them under a microscope. I just find the history interesting. Religious disciplines are obviously products of their environment, but that doesn't mean that's all they are. Anyhow, there's still good reason to avoid caffeine, depending on your priorities and concerns.

[1] Doing some Googling to confirm my memory and that I'm not completely talking out my a--, it seems caffeine was first isolated in 1819. The Clean Living movement (which I didn't remember by name until Googling), was later than I seemed to remember.

That's very interesting of course, and explains the history, however it's been well over a century now since this stuff, so people should know better about relative safety of different foods and not just stick to what John Kellogg said. We see here that the Mormons are now OKing soda, which wasn't around in the 1800s, despite us now knowing just how horribly unhealthy it is, yet they don't want to reverse their stance on tea, which has been used for many centuries starting in Asia and later spread to every corner of the planet, and isn't really associated with any significant health problems (in fact, green tea is consumed in large quantities in Japan, which has the highest life expectancy in the world).

"No tea and coffee" is literally the only thing you got right in your entire post.

There are about as many Mormons as there are Southern Baptists, which most consider "a pretty big denomination" of Protestantism. To my knowledge, BYU has not re-banned caffeinated soda. Regarding the Curse of Ham:

"In 1931, Joseph Fielding Smith wrote on the same topic in The Way to Perfection: Short Discourses on Gospel Themes, generating controversy within and without Mormonism. For evidence that modern blacks were descended from Cain, Smith wrote that "it is generally believed that" Cain's curse was continued through his descendants and through Ham's wife. Smith states that "some of the brethren who were associate with Joseph Smith have declared that he taught this doctrine." In 1978, when the church ended the ban on the priesthood, Bruce R. McConkie taught that the ancient curse of Cain and Ham was no longer in effect.[9]:117

General authorities in the LDS church favored Smith's explanation until 2013, when an LDS Church-published online essay "disavowed" the idea that black skin is the sign of a curse."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_people_and_Mormonism#Cur...

They might not teach it but many do practice it in lots of more or less subtle ways.

Orthodox here, there's a couple distinctions. Unlike our friends the Catholics, we maintain that physical bodies and the physical world are good and natural. Eating delicious food can bring you closer to God, exercise can bring you closer to God, admiration of nature, etc.

There is a separate concept of "living apart from the world". My understanding of this is not "go live in the woods" bur rather "don't be complacent". It's striving for the best possible value system regardless of how people choose to act around you. Society can (and should!) be improved.

I grew up Catholic, and I don't recall any teaching that eating delicious food, exercising, or admiration of nature would take us farther from God.

One thing I do remember from when I was a kid: whenever our priest stopped by the house for a visit, my parents always offered him a shot of whiskey!

Some of the healthiest, longest living, most joyful and expressive societies are traditionally catholic. E.g. Italians. I think you are confusing Catholics with Calvinists, but the Swiss are pretty good at enjoying themselves also. If you are going to rampantly stereotype, then maybe it's a north south thing, but I doubt that too as the Swedes love their saunas and can certainly have a good time.

Catholics believe the material world is good too? Perhaps youre confusing us with the puritans?

Monasticism is a big part of the Orthodox tradition.

Yes not but all are expected to be monks, and they live apart from everyone, not just "the secular world"

I'm not sure I understand the distinction you're trying to make. Most (reasonably practical) religions do not expect everyone to become a hermit. The notion that Eastern Orthodoxy is some kind of super-worldly religion of communing with a tub of ice cream just doesn't strike me as very accurate at all.

I wasn't trying to portray as some kind of super-worldly religion, simply saying the exception does not prove the rule.

I'm not saying you're trying to portray it as anything (especially since my comment was in reply to someone else), I'm saying that as a branch of Christianity, the Monastic tradition has lasted longer than in the Eastern Orthodox churches than in many others and this is not a particularly difficult thing to notice. It pops out at you if you decide to, say, inflict The Brothers Karamazov on yourself or read news like:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/20/world/europe/mount-athos-...

Your last name checks out ;) Thanks for the reply.

I don't know much about Protestants, despite having lived in England for a while. I live in Canada and regularly travel to the US, and still don't know about Protestantism deeply. The little bit I do, has generally led to a positive opinion, as it aligns somewhat more with what I'd believe in.

Some Orthodox monks deliberately sought isolation from worldly life to better practice spiritual virtues, like most monks of any faith.

Some other Orthodox monks practiced the reverse: living among regular people and keep their monastic status secret. The latter was (is) considered a more difficult feat.

I agree that Protestant Christianity ought to be the same. In practice, books like 'The Benedictine Option' suggest that Protestants are not of one mind about the matter.

Dreher isn't a protestant; he's Orthodox. Really, he's kind of a LARPer, and that book has received vastly more attention than it deserves.

I'm thinking of all the Protestants I know who have it on their bookshelves. I only have it on mine to try and understand what's gotten into their thinking.

Dreher is an (ineffective) algorithm oligarch types have latched onto to try to bring right wing christians under social control. As far as I can tell, Dreher's career consists of being a consumerist hipster (muh microbrews, muh foodie whaddevers) and pretending to be a right wing christian. He's not actually any more Christian or right wing than any other hipster type, and is certainly not conservative at all, despite the outlet he writes for. His psychological furniture is precisely that of a hipster atheist; just a particularly chicken chested one with certain prejudices he finds convenient to excuse with religion. He's changed religions ... I think 3-4 times now, for what amounts to hipster "not cool enough" reasons. Actually religious people in America such as your protestant friends think completely differently. I mean; actually religious people die for religious conviction; Dreher changes religion like a preppie changes ties that go out of fashion. There is no fear of God's wrath in Dreher, no wonder at the mystery of life and the universe; he just thinks gay people are icky, and modernity is kind of groace. His Benedict book is preposterously shallow; it is abundantly obvious he's barely skimmed the history of Christianity, even Benedict's rule: his book is basically a glorified 23 year old hipster's blog post. If you really want to understand protestantism; study the 30 year's war and the paintings of Cranach. Or the Taliban. At least they actually believe in God.

Source: I'm not particularly religious, but I know Dreher, and was at one point considered a thinker in this domain.

Protestant Christianity was what I was brought up with and I never heard anything specific about that.

That sounds like a plan for a better world, a world where all people reach fulfillment and die in peace. Im curious, do people convert to your religion often? Are Sikh an inclusive religion?

People do convert to Sikhism, but Sikhs don't focus as heavily on getting people converted. The religion is inclusive, and is generally quite welcoming, but there's hardly any appetite for forcing it upon others. This is primarily because the religion is secular at its very core. It had a pivotal role in standing up for rights of other religions during the Mughal rule in the Indian sub-continent. And, there's also the belief that just by putting on the 'Sikh' label, you don't really gain anything. The ultimate purpose is to just become a better human being (the barometer here being the teachings of Guru Granth Sahib, which is generally quite humanistic in its approach. The authors in fact include a number of non-Sikhs). As long as you're a good human being (as in help others, meditate and earn honestly to be basic), it doesn't matter what label you are, is one of the core beliefs. Converts aren't looked down upon, because almost everyone really converted at some point in time, as it's around 500 years old as a religion. On a side note, you'll sometimes hear its 300 years old, but that's incorrect, as that event refers to the birth of Khalsa. A Sikh should generally aim to become a Khalsa. Becoming a Khalsa is kind of similar to baptism, but it's voluntary and mostly done when you grow up and feel you're ready for it (some teens do it under the influence of parents, but I, along with many other Sikhs probably, tend to believe that is against the spirit of the religion. People in early teens don't have a full understanding of what they want, and that's why parents shouldn't do it for them IMHO). I'm in my late 20s and not a Khalsa, for example. And, there are many (probably the majority) like me, not Khalsa but just Sikh.

An example is - I studied in two different schools. The first school was Catholic, and I studied there for 12 years. The management used to heavily encourage conversion. For students, there were some benefits like no tuition fees, and maybe some other stuff. For teachers, it was probably a better career. I spent another 2 years in a Sikh school. In that school, rewards were totally independent of religion. If you scored above 90%, you'll get your tuition fees waived. If you were a single girl child (due to female infanticide in the region), I think they did something as well. There was no focus on converting non-Sikhs. This is not to diss on Catholicism, as I've respect for Christians in general and I personally know many good ones, it's probably just that my school didn't do it right. I just find being charitable only to people who are the same religion as yours, not a great idea. Religion shouldn't be a consideration during charity (and in conduct towards people otherwise too).

(edited for clarity)

That is really beautiful.

In today's internet, very, very rarely, do you get to read something that really makes you aware of this big humanity that we're all a part of. I'll save your note and read it to myself every once in a while so that I never forget that lines are drawn by people. So that I can try to become a better human too.

I'm glad you liked it. Exactly! All those lines are artificial, and it's sad the world hasn't yet left behind discrimination, and it's a major problem in almost every society in one form or the other.

Thank you for this. This is probably the most I've learned about Sikhism in one sitting. I appreciate your generosity!

All your comments throughout this thread have been extremely interesting to read. Thanks for taking the time to share with us!

Interesting thing I learned recently is it's pronounced "sick", at least according to the world Sikh council [1]. I always thought it was "seek".

1) http://www.spokesman.com/blogs/commcomm/2012/aug/09/pronounc...

Well, it's "Sick" with an aspirated "k", which is what the "kh" is for. "Seek" is just mangled pronunciation like "goo-roo" for "guru".

Hinduism calls it Karma yoga[1] - the path of selfless action. It is portrayed in no way inferior to other approaches. Do you work well with passion without attachment towards results.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karma_yoga

> Do you work well with passion without attachment towards results.

I assume by "results" you mean recompense or renown, since you mention doing work "well". I only mention it because to me "results" are what I use to define whether my work was done well, and aren't what I think of when considering whether it was materially beneficial for me.

I think the key there is "attachment." I think seeing the results without being attached to it can also improve analysis of the outcome with respect to the quality of input if there is less personal/emotional attachment to the work that is being accomplished.

The idea is to do one's work without emotional attachment to "results". In modern day psychology it is called "self-distancing". It is nothing mystical but commonsense. The way to understand the rationale is; even though "self-effort" has to be put forth towards a goal, because there can be so many other factors involved in deciding the outcome (most important being random chance) that it is best to have no emotional ties to outcomes. That way one does not fall into despair and a negative frame of mind if things turn out wrong but still can choose to experience joy when things turn out well.

The idea is to focus on doing your job well and release yourself from the pressure of the side effects, like fame and other things that are expected rewards for a job well done.

Getting those rewards might represent their own bit of karma yoga, with separate effort.

It is silly to think a divine entity is going to descend from the heavens to ensure that you get your just rewards for doing a good job.

"but unlike most major religions, they discourage retreating from the world and ordinary secular life."

I think that would be a mischaracterization of major religions. For example Christianity has its mystics and ascetics, but they it doesnt preach that all, or even the vast majority should pursue this path. Instead, Christianity teaches that its faithful should take time to retreat and pray, to go back into the world a more faithful servant of God.

Even the Saints and ascetics don't retreat from the world but rather seek silence. St. Benedict, the paradigm of the Catholic monk would leave the monastery every month to meet up with his sister.

> they discourage retreating from the world and ordinary secular life.

I'm not really an expect in this, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasticism seems like it's about half the religions that encourage it and half that don't, and some seriously discourage it, like Judaism and Islam.

The Sikh history provides at least one explanation for this. They're a very new group, formed around the 1600s. For a long time they lived in adverse conditions, at odds with local rulers, disadvantaged by numerical inferiority.

Given that monk culture is a form of specialization, similar to how a professional army is a specialization, and that specialization can't appear in adverse, numerically difficult situations, that could explain why Sikhs don't have monkhood, instead preferring rounded jack-of-all-trades social roles.

For an opposite extreme, there's The Kingdom of Tibet, which until Chinese occupation had 1/3 of its (male?) population in monastic life. That's extremely special; if only it had lasted.

This was a wonderful read.

This article plus some of the comments here make me think of the best homeless meal service in San Diego when I was homeless there. My old homeless blog simply lists them as The Vegans and I think that's how they self identified. My impression was they were some kind of church group, but unlike most church-affiliated homeless services, they never identified their organization that I know of.

They served a meal once a week. It was all vegetarian and it was hands down the best free meal I had as a homeless person. They also let you take a couple of sack lunches with vegetarian sandwiches, like peanut butter, plus snacks.

Many free meals involve listening to a sermon. A lot of organizations treat homeless people pretty bad while supposedly trying to help them.

There was none of the usual crap with this group. They also gave away free clothes or blankets or whatever they had.

I wish far more homeless services met a similar standard.

You might be thinking of Langar [0]. It's a practice from Sikhism where "a free meal is served to all the visitors, without distinction of religion, caste, gender, economic status or ethnicity. The free meal is always vegetarian". In many ways, Sikhism is a pretty great culture. One of my dreams is to run a Langar one day.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langar_(Sikhism)

This was done on a public sidewalk, not in a building. Other than that, yes, it's possible. That fits. Thank you.

Langar doesn't have to be in a Gurdwara. The purpose of the meal is to serve food to all (especially the needy), and for even the privileged ones in the society to sit down and have the same food in the same conditions (even the richest person should be in the same queue and have Langar with people from all strata of society) to promote a sense of equality. One of the major Langar charities, The Midland Langar Seva Society (https://www.midlandlangarseva.org/), does it on the streets, as do many others. The first ever Langar by Guru Nanak (the founder of the religion) was on the street as well. But, it's kind of hard to tell (without more details) whether what you had was langar. And, it doesn't really matter whether it is Langar, because it serves the same purpose, and the people doing that are definitely doing a service to the society the same way.

When it comes to using charity as a tool to lure people into some ideology is what puts me off. Ideally, charity should be done to help others, and not for self-promotion or for the promotion of an ideology is what I've learnt as a Sikh, and would like to retain the same belief even if I'm not a Sikh some day.

I've done a little searching and can't find anything that confirms details. It was some years ago. I have no idea if it still goes on.

I've really enjoyed your comments in this discussion. Thank you for your contribution here.

It happens every week in Vancouver on East Hastings street.

Kind, non-judgemental, not pushing any agenda. Just quietly doing a good thing.

I ate it a few times when I was in bad shape. It was usually the best/only thing I ate that day.

Sources of more information.

Reddit AMA by one of Sikh drivers here - https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/be99o8/hi_im_satnam_s...

Untold America episode here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKXf89yNDP4&list=PLZd3QRtSy5...

Like truck driving, there are many gaps and shortages in the U.S economy that are prime opportunities for immigrants to fill. Either because a majority in some way stigmatize the work, or the pay is too low, etc. It's sad to see that immigration has become a taboo in certain parts of the country, as not only do immigrants in general contribute greatly to the economy, but they also impact our culture in significant ways.

I expect more profiles like this to spring up in the next few years, as America continues to grow with a low "native" birth rate, immigration will fill the void.

>Either because a majority in some way stigmatize the work, or the pay is too low, etc.

The 'pay is too low' bit always bothers me. It implies that we should want to bring in a serf class to do work Americans won't. It's usually in conjunction with some non-white immigrant group, usually Hispanics, which makes it racist to boot. We must not accept arguments about not being able to find workers because the pay is too low. Raise the pay. The wealth and income gaps are bad enough, don't keep pushing down the median wages by bringing in more serf class workers who are willing to accept these wages.

Some of those people risk their lives trying to get here because it's such a huge improvement for them.

The reality is that by letting people in, you are vastly improving their lot in life, and all the economic research show it doesn't really hurt anyone here:

https://www.cato.org/blog/14-most-common-arguments-against-i...

It may be a good deal for the individual confronted with the binary choice, however, that does not change this phenomenon's essential reliance on the exploitation of the poverty of the developing world. The same dynamic is what enables sex tourism and exploitative natural resource extraction, and these are understood to be wrong for the aforementioned reason. Economic incentives cause the owning classes to overlook this in the case of the labor market, however. If there is a shortage of job applicants, raise the offered pay. This is the supposed way that 'free markets' are intended to function, but their putative proponents fight tooth and nail to prevent this from being necessary.

And...keeping people out is going to change that how?

I'm okay with this as long as I NEVER hear about wage gap, wealth gap, or growing poverty in the US political discussion again. I never want to hear about increasing entitlements, food stamps, none of it. If we continue this policy, those outcomes are by design. This policy is a charity work for the poor of other countries, paid for by the suppressed wages of the American poor. As long as we can all agree that's the goal, or at least an accepted side effect, I'm willing to go along.

In general I agree with you, but I do believe that there are certain jobs that a majority of Americans simply will not consider. While there is definitely some xenophobic reasons behind this, I think the bulk of it can be explained in economics terms. The average American worker is pretty well educated compared to the rest of the world and has a much higher wage ceiling if they are willing to be selective. We do however need more wage growth in this economy and it's good to see the Fed coming to grips with this and retreating from further interest rate increases.

What jobs will Americans not consider at a reasonable pay rate?

"Reasonable rate" means what?

Working in slaughterhouses, working in fields picking produce, working in construction, working the back of house for restaurants, working as housekeepers, working as landscapers or day laborers, working at the car wash. These are all jobs with lots of immigrants. Are you surprised to learn this?

A reasonable rate means the market rate before you deflate it with cheap labor. I've personally worked 3 of those jobs so yea it's pretty surprising that everyone thinks americans are unwilling to do this stuff.

The market rate is already in effect.

What intrinsic property of immigrants do you believe makes them better suited to work grueling jobs at wages that white people won't accept?

They accept less pay for the same work. Did you not read my comment?

I am having a hard time believing that you did not know this fact before our exchange.

People raised as rural peasants have a lot more stamina for doing hard agricultural labor than people raised in suburbs without a manual-labor background. Making this observation isn’t “racist”.

If immigration were blocked, just raising agricultural workers’ pay wouldn’t be enough to fill all of those jobs. But raising those jobs’ pay (e.g. by raising the federal minimum wage and enforcing it) would be a good idea anyway. Immigrant farm workers should still be paid fair wages.

Stamina is the wrong word though. It's willingness or grit or something, not an innate physical characteristic that they picked up from rural poverty.

Fun that your edit added "willing" while I was writing this.

I think stamina is the correct word.

I'm 54. My ex husband is the same age and was career military.

At some point in his career, they changed the PT test standards for younger military members because young people growing up in front of TVs and computers didn't have the stamina his generation had at the same age. Meanwhile, they did not lower the test standards for him/his age group. He quite resented it.

In other words, this is Federal policy acknowledging this change.

Last I heard, the military is having increasing difficulty getting qualified applicants because young people today are simply out of shape compared to previous generations. I've also seen articles that say we increasingly import construction workers because middle and upper class young white males no longer take construction jobs during the summer in high school and college like they routinely did when I was that age.

A lot of it is stamina. Both physical and mental. Rural peasants are really tough in a way that is extremely foreign to suburbanites.

My godfather (indigenous peasant in rural Mexico) spent some time in his youth carrying two 50-pound bottles of liquor on his back all day long up and down mountains over a rough trail. I get winded if I try to carry one of those bottles for a block of flat sidewalk. If someone asked me to strap two to a tumpline and hike up a mountain I would call them crazy.

He spent other years working on coffee plantations under thieving brutal racist owners. And continued working on his own small plots of land every day up to maybe age 70, even as his body was thoroughly worn out.

Now his grandchildren are white-collar professionals.

This kind of hard manual labor is as demanding as any high-level sport. It takes years of (mental and physical) training to be able to handle it without falling apart.

Do it as much as you can for month and see how far you get.

I'm 39 and for the last 6 months I've been doing a job that involves lots of manual labor, it's gotten easier, not harder. I guess I was in relatively decent condition at the start though, if you consider the US average.

What you have "stamina" for is dependent on your perception of alternatives.

I remember when darker brown people were considered to have a lot of "stamina" in the US. Now we've changed our focus to a lighter shade of brown I guess. Progress?

My memory of construction sites in urban Texas about 15 years ago, was that the day laborers I worked with were very nearly all African-American, and it was the skilled workers constructing the high rises who were Spanish speaking. No idea if that was representative or just the neighborhood or if it is different these days. I imagine that there is more grueling work though than cleaning up rebar and junk so I don't know what it says about stamina.

I think another field is nursing, where large numbers of Indians are already employed in the US.

the issue is that they dont understand labor politics like the old school blue collar white and black americans do. They end up getting screwed like what happened with the medallion system all over America. I have read many comments about the medallion shake up where people simply said that it wouldnt have happened to white driver owners and that's the truth.

Immigrants contributing 'greatly' is not an established fact.

Here's a meta analysis saying that at best the economic impact is minor, and worse still only the mega-rich benefit, while poor people actually suffer from it:

https://www.nber.org/papers/w16736

If the birth rate is too 'low' then why not pay more benefits for having kids? Or raise the retirement age, as we obviously need to before our pensions all go bankrupt?

Worse still, mass-migration is just shunting the problem down the line a generation or two, while most countries using it aren't investing enough in houses, hospitals, infrastructure, etc. to cater for the mass migration.

“Immigrants contributing greatly is not an established fact”

Funny thing to say about a country made up of immigrants...

Let me guess, you’re not from nyc. You should visit Ellis island sometime.

It IS the US immigration that has made it what it is now. I always love this part of a speech by Lincoln.

“But when they look through that old Declaration of Independence they find that those old men say that ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,’ and then they feel that that moral sentiment taught in that day evidences their relation to those men, that it is the father of all moral principle in them, and that they have a right to claim it as though they were blood of the blood, and flesh of the flesh, of the men who wrote that Declaration, and so they are.“

The meta analysis you link doesn't seem to quite agree with the way you're framing it. Quoting some of the relevant paragraphs:

> The likelihood and magnitude of adverse labor market effects for natives from immigration are substantially weaker than often perceived. Within the large empirical literature looking at the effects of immigration on native employment and wages, most studies find only minor displacement effects even after very large immigrant flows. On the other hand, some more recent studies have found larger effects, and many studies note that the negative effects are concentrated on certain parts of the native population. The parts of the population most typically affected are the less-educated natives or the earlier immigrant cohorts -- that is, those who are the closest substitutes to the new immigrant flow currently experienced by Europe.

> Immigration is often viewed as a large fiscal burden for European public finances or as a possible saviour if correctly harnessed. This has been palpable in the recent political atmospheres of France, Italy, and Germany, for instance. Most empirical studies, however, estimate the fiscal impacts of immigration to be very small. There certainly exist large differences across migrant groups in the costs and benefits they cause for a host country; the net impact depends heavily on the migrants age, education, and duration of stay. On average, immigrants appear to have a minor positive net fiscal effect for host countries. Of course, these benefits are not uniformly distributed across the native population and sectors of the economy.

The gist being that overall the adverse effects immigration has on the market is much smaller than people perceive, that those most affected are either the prior generation of immigrants or those with less education and that the negative fiscal impacts are negligible at best, with immigrants generally contributing in a positive way.

How am I framing it?

What you quoted supports what I said.

Economic benefits negligible.

Poor people suffer.

How can the effects be minor? Immigrants are doing work for cheaper than their domestic counter parts or they wouldn't be employed. This means they are producing economic value in excess of their compensation more than their domestic peers.

Where does this excess economic value go? It lowers the cost, for one. This is common sense.

Given the amount of illegal immigration and the support structure that exists among employers, you will have a hard time convincing me their effect on the economy is minor. Why would anyone bother with all the trouble if what you say is accurate?

I could see an argument that it allows employers to significantly lower their salaries below a livable wage for non illegals who have to pay taxes and such. So, citizens are losing the job and pay which goes to someone that does not contribute to the country via taxes, and perhaps a good chunk is sent back to their home country. Thus, the end result is the country's citizenry become poorer through illegal immigration.

Immigrants pay taxes. I would worry more about the broader effects of globalization as a whole than I would about immigrants remitted part of their paycheck back to their home country. And dollars aren't what makes the American economy strong -- it's goods and services we get in exchange for them, in the form of imports and (as one example) immigrant labor.

Before you come tell me that immigration is a net drain on the American economy, you should understand the dominant view in the field is that this is false. You will need to provide some evidence that what you are saying is true, not just a made up rationale.

I said illegal immigration, not immigration in general.

Does your analysis show illegal immigration is a net gain?

As an aside to this happening, I'm very excited about the idea of good Indian food making its way throughout the US similar to how Chinese food did before - even if it gets slightly Americanized along the way, I'd be extremely happy if I could go back east to my small town and find a good chicken curry and naan...

More on topic, what's probably missing here is context; the Sikh's revolutionized trucking in India by changing the way that trucking worked - shorter runs done by small teams working in shifts nearer to their homes - more like a relay race than a long haul marathon that used to be more common in America (see companies like Rivigo). They've now simply brought that culture to America where trucking is huge and opportunities are practically boundless.

good read, i can totally relate on some levels, i used to work at this company which exclusively helped Sikh cdl holders with their tickets and fuel card discounts. Most of them are genuinely living the american dream. Godspeed....Wonder how automation, ai, and self-driving is going to impact this field? .....hopefully everyone has a plan-b...Also i'm curious to find out how electronic logbooks have affected them so far ?

Years ago I saw statistics for the turnover rate of truck drivers and it was quite high. Seems like there are a small number of drivers who make it a career but most move on to other things after a few years. Haven't seen this come up during discussions about drivers being replaced by autonomous vehicles but it seems rather important. Wonder if turn over numbers are very different for Sikhs.

while i was working for this xyz CDL marketing company, i did not come across any stats, but i saw fathers passing down the biz to their sons, and/or family members working all together to run their own trucking biz each playing various roles and running it quite efficiently. Since they do not have college degrees they are locked in and thus do successfully make a career of it, additionally some of them don't drink and have good driving records.

Also the sikh community inherently feels persecuted wherever they go due to their rigid beliefs, unfortunately this is also true in their homeland-India, but which in turn makes them help each other out even more, their community is well-organized and close-knit. There truly was a constant in-flux of new younger drivers who had plans of a long career.

Also, climate change/global warming was also another albatross around their necks...farming and produce are significantly affected each year due to floods an/or droughts

According to some of these articles it's been as high as 130%. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=trucker+turnover&t=fpas&ia=web

Unrelated but I'm really glad to see someone use duckduckgo in the wild

It's the only way to fly.

Much of it seems to be truckers just switching companies

http://archive.is/Dr07t

This was a great read and got me interested in learning more about the Sikh religion. Does anyone have some advice for a westerner interested in starting to learn about the religion?

There is a channel called Basics of Sikhi on Youtube. It was started by a Brit called Jagraj Singh, and it is one of the golden resources to get started. Jagraj is no longer alive and succumbed to cancer, so the channel might not be as active. But, it should still have relevant content, as the age of the content shouldn't really matter.

Thanks

I'd recommend finding a local Gurudwara (their place of worship) and visiting there during Langar. Langar is when they offer free meals to all visitors of the temple, no questions asked. People volunteer to cook these meals, serve them to people, doing the dishes etc.

I'd recommend first visiting the temple and seeing it yourself.

Thanks for the advice

There might be something on Youtube.

Saw a video recently that touched on this topic - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKXf89yNDP4

Only short and worth the watch.

I was driving through Nebraska on the way to Colorado in winter 2009, when behind me from the distance, I saw an 18-wheeler with its hood in the shape of the Tasmanian devil (from Looney Tunes). The truck looked like it was about to gobble up the guy in front. I am Indian, and I thought, wow, this is way too much character for a U. S. truck driver!! Eventually the guy passed me, and I saw that he was a Sikh :)

I had no idea this was happening; adds some context to this tragedy: https://sports.yahoo.com/know-jaskirat-singh-sidhu-driver-ch...

Not really. That’s in Canada. And the Sikh population is highly integrated and successful in the Canadian system. I believe 3 cabinet members in the current Canadian government are Sikh.

That’s very different from the status of the Sikh population in the US, so I’m not sure how it adds any context to this article.

'“This is like home,” says Pal, the name he uses on the road (said like “Paul”).'

No, it definitely isn't pronounced like "Paul" (the way Westerners mangle "Nepal".) It's more like "paal" with a soft "l".

Looking through the discussion here I am thrilled that it is conducted in such a civilized & positive way. No one shouting others down as Nazis. I am inordinately pleased to see that people want to learn and are open-minded enough to realize that distant cultures can have lessons to learn from. I usually lurk in HN but this time I feel obliged to at least say that I appreciate the company around here. Thanks all!

They offered the world order!

> The drivers, who followed Sikh traditions by wrapping their uncut hair in turbans, said bosses asked them to remove the turbans.

Ironically, Quebec has made it a law now.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/quebec-laicity-secul...

It's against the site guidelines to use HN for political battle or predefined agendas. It's a particularly serious abuse to use multiple accounts to do it.

When people abuse HN like this, we eventually ban their main account as well, so please stop and don't do it again.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Ontario has a law allowing Sikhs to wear turbans instead of motorbike helmets:

https://globalnews.ca/news/4533568/ontario-government-to-exe...

> ban public workers in positions of authority from wearing religious symbols.

> public workers

public worker in a position of authority

So it applies only to specific subsets of public roles (police, judge, etc).

It also applies to teachers, but I am not sure this was a good idea.

Switzerland has a similar law too https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/church-and-state_geneva-secular...

AFAIK the best-known example of this is France.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_law_on_secularity_and_c...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_ban_on_face_covering

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_scarf_controversy_in_F...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La%C3%AFcit%C3%A9

France's laws are a lot more universal I thought, not limited to certain jobs.

Following the footsteps of the mother country I guess.

I wonder why does rest of Canada allows Québec to act as a rogue province.

IIRC, Some sects of Sikhs do not insist (or perhaps even shun) the wearing of the turban. I think the original core population of Sikhs that emigrated to Canada were mostly these non-Khalsa Sikhs.

I'd say this is not entirely correct. There is no sect of Sikhism that shuns the turban to the best of my knowledge. And, I think there is this gross misunderstanding that you have to wear the turban to be a Sikh. As a Khalsa, you have to have unshorn hair, and turban is a practical way to cover it up. In fact, turban isn't mandatory when looking at the technicalities (there are a lot of Sikhs who might disagree with me on this). The Kes (unshorn hair) are. And, that too is a requirement only for Khalsa. I'm a Sikh (not Khalsa), but I keep unshorn hair and wear a turban because I like it. And, there are a lot of people like myself. A lot of non-Khalsa Sikhs wear turbans as a step towards the path to becoming a Khalsa.

Not sure how you got that from that link. There's a whole section on different religious associations. It points out that it's a religious requirement for Sikhs - observant baptised Sikhs are required to wear a turban.

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