If you thought there were a lot of trucks on the highway last time you drove it, just wait. If you love to drive and are looking for a career change, read on.
...there is currently a shortage of 20,000 long-haul drivers--and that number is growing. To this statistic must be added the 219,000 truck drivers who are 55 and over that will need to be replaced in the next decade. When the increased need for drivers is factored along with the attrition, there is a mammoth need to quickly find more truckers.
According to this article on Forbes.com by Robert Malone, the condition of the trucking industry should concern all of us.
The trucking industry affects all of us in some way or another. Whether you're a business waiting on product or supplies to be transported, or a consumer who's watching rising prices.
There's an additional expense too.
The trucking industry's perception of the shortage has been influenced by the shift of drivers from one carrier to another. This is referred to within the industry as churning, and the annual turnover rate last year was pegged at 121%. The filling of the shortage will not be made up from within the trucking industry. According to Bill Graves, the ATA's chief executive, "The driver market is the tightest [it has been ] in 20 years."
121% turnover! Ouch. I don't know what that costs the industry as a whole, but it's probably a sizeable amount.
When we were both younger, a friend of mine was an over-the-road (OTR) driver. It can be an unbelievable grind. Companies generally push their drivers and their machines hard, drivers can be the "hard-living" sort, and costs for independent drivers keep rising.
Indeed, if the impact of more-than-$70 per barrel oil is also factored in, there may well be grim trucking times ahead. "The cost of fuel for long-haul truckers has increased 51 cents per gallon within the last year," says Mike Russell, spokesman for the ATA. "This has exacerbated the shortage-of-drivers problem." Since many truckers are independent owner-drivers, the fuel shortage hits them directly in their wallets.
This is an issue to watch. If the industry needs more drivers, they'd better clean up their act in order to attract new drivers.
Oh, and on another note. You think that independent owner-drivers want to see the free flow of oil at market prices? Places like Anwar and Iraq have significant influence on what happens here at home.
Remember that the next time you shake your head at how prices of your favorite things keep rising.
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