Driver Shortage

There are fears the summer driving season could be curtailed by a looming driver shortage for gasoline tank car drivers. Of course, word of driver shortages is nothing new for the overall trucking industry, which estimates it is approximately 50,000 drivers short of what carrier executives say they could use to fill trucks as the nation emerges from the post-coronavirus lockdown.

Entitled, “Drivers Wanted: Using data to understand the commercial truck driver shortage,” the study observed that while the American Trucking Associations (ATA), for example, has stated that there has been a driver shortage for the last 15 years, whereas the Bureau of Labor Statistics has reported there are high rates of occupational attachment among truck drivers that haul freight, which, in turn, suggests that over time the labor market would respond to price signals in a roughly normal and predictable way.

The challenges facing the trucking industry have only increased over the course of the past year, but with a bold vision and strategic changes, the industry could lie at a point of enormous opportunity.

This original research study examines the extent and shape of the commercial trucking shortage, the complications from the pandemic, and the possible steps toward solutions that benefit truckers and businesses alike.

Logistics Management Group News Editor Jeff Berman recently spoke with Phil Byrd. Byrd is well-accomplished in the trucking sector, as a past chairman of the American Trucking Association, the head of the Daseke Leadership Council, and currently the CEO of one of Daseke’s operating companies, Bulldog Hiway Express.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, although no doubt leaning Republican and backing politicians with pro-business agendas, never takes a stance on presidential preferences. And 2020 will be no exception. But that hardly means the Chamber will be sitting on the sidelines when it comes to transport and logistics’ priorities this year.

The American Transportation Research Institute, the trucking industry’s not-for-profit research institute, unveiled its annual Top Industry Issues report on October 6, 2019, and for the third year in a row, a shortage of drivers is the top-ranked issue for trucking fleets.

In this analysis, we focus only on drivers of Class 8 tractor-trailers, this is where the bulk of the truck driver shortage prevails.

The decades-old driver shortage in the trucking industry is like a toothache that you ignore - it tends just to get worse and worse without treatment.

The decades-old driver shortage in the trucking industry is like a toothache that you ignore—it tends just to get worse and worse without treatment. The American Trucking Associations’ (ATA) latest forecast that the industry is expected to need 60,800 more for-hire over-the-road truckload drivers at the end of the year did not startle any trucking executive grappling with the shortage.

While it is true that 2018 marked what could be described as a boom year for the freight economy, a new report issued this week by the American Trucking Associations (ATA) revealed that the trucking sector needed 60,800 more for-hire over-the-road truckload drivers at the end of the year to meet the nation’s freight services demands.

The driver shortage is causing serious concerns across the industry. But the solution is not just to add more drivers.

A recent report issued by the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) questions if the driver shortage is as bad as it’s purported to be within industry circles.

A recent report issued by the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics questions if the driver shortage is as bad as it purported to be within industry circles.

A recent report issued by the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) questions if the driver shortage is as bad as it purported to be within industry circles.