They have a set amount they are being paid and increasing cost for parts, insurance, and fuel.

I'm guessing the only thing they can control is wages. There's always someone willing to step in at the lower wage but, seriously folks, try doing this job. It's nuts.

In addition to:

• driving a bus full of screaming children (literally, my kids bus had an epidemic of kids screaming as loud as they could to see how mad it made the driver, they had to remove some kids permanently to make them stop),

• constantly being exposed to every virus you can think of, and

• manuevering a massive vehicle through streets clogged by parked double wide pick-up trucks ('Berta!)

You are also working odd hours for crap pay.

Then your colleagues start calling in sick, or quitting because some kid spit on them, or they don't want to drive after a bad storm (they don't close schools here, they will sometimes not run buses but I've seen them run when it really wasn't safe) and you end up working double routes with parents giving you a hard time.

It's no wonder the drivers are frustrated.

Can confirm that school buses are almost always lard for my daughter's field trips.

All the school bus companies somehow pay the exact same rates. There is no competition between them

School bus lines tend to be natural monopolies as the school boards – which are also monopolies – typically contract all the bussing required from one provider, so I don't discount your no competition assertion.

But all businesses converging on the same price is also a sign of strong competition. In a competitive market each player will keep sharpening their pencils until there is no room left. Once the pencils have been sharped to where they can be sharpened no more, everyone will end up in the same place. Only in a market lacking competition can there be room for price to diverge.