No offence and I mean that, but I have to call bs on that. Trucks were made for hauling and that's what true truck people do with them. Many more people these days are dressing them up in cute outfits and hauling nothing but kids and groceries, but to some of us a truck has always been the first piece of gear in our arsenal of tools and understand its limitations. For a great many of us our tools alone reach those rated figures before we even head to the material yard. If tradesmen laid aside common sense and rely only on the figures in the paperwork we'd all be driving 5 ton stake beds just to cover our arses.
If some retard is trying to pull an earthmover with a half ton then his lifes ambition is to fail. Otherwise legality is about who ran the red light. No one is looking at payload unless it's the retard dragging his bumper and the earth mover colliding with the hole Alpha Delta class stuffed in a Volkswagen and no one admitting fault. That same owners manual tells you your vehicle is designed for optimum performance and bla, bla and recommends against modifications so there's always a cat to chase up a tree if you're a pessimist but lets keep it real.