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TRUCKING SEARCH FOR YOUNG DRIVERS * USA: Comes up very short about
* New York - Trucking Industry: 40,000 drivers shortfall & aging workforce, bigger questions for the future
-- The trucking industry says the average age of drivers is nearing 50, and trucking companies and their customers face a looming demographic problem because fewer younger workers are interested in filling empty seats... Kevin Young, a 37-year-old truck driver from Kentucky, is the third generation in his family to take to the open road and loves his job so much that he’s lost two marriages over it. Mr. Young, got his Commercial Driver’s License as soon as he was eligible at age 21... The trucking industry is beginning to feel the impact of a shortfall of some 35,000 to 40,000 drivers needed to move goods, some believe this will grow to as much as 240,000 drivers by 2022, said Gail Rutkowski, executive director of the National Shippers Transportation Council, or NASSTRAC... Experts say there are many reasons behind the shortage, including more stringent work requirements as safety regulations have expanded and low pay that, despite recent gains, has made the tough working conditions tougher to bear. But trucking is also driving headlong into demographic reality: its workforce is getting older, and younger Americans are showing less interest in a career on the highway... This shortage is buffeting the trucking industry as the volume of goods grows with the economy... It is also increasing costs for shippers as carriers step up efforts to recruit and retain drivers... Carrier shipping rates have gone up 8% in a year “at a time when diesel fuel, which is typically one of the largest drivers of trucking cost, dropped nearly 25%” ...
Trucking cos. has had trouble keeping truck drivers for more than 10 months in its small private fleet that employs nine drivers because larger companies are in something of a poaching war, paying thousands of dollars in sign-on bonuses to attract new drivers... The ATA estimates more than a third of companies owning private fleets and less-than-truckload carriers, which carry goods for multiple shippers on one truck, are now offering signing bonuses. Nearly half of truckload carriers, which serve one shipper at a time and operate on longer routes, are doing the same... The shortage has had some benefit for drivers. The ATA said average driver pay across the industry was more than $54,585 in 2014, up 9% from about $50,000 in 2013... But the ability to attract a younger generation will depend on the industry’s ability to make trucking appealing again... Although he is 37, Mr. Young, the truck driver from Kentucky, considers himself an old-timer on the road and thinks the next generation of young drivers don’t have a love of the job, he said. “If the young people would take more pride in it, it would be a lot better out here” ... (PHOTO - Kevin Young says truck driving is a lifestyle and a career that has cost him two marriages. His wife, Shannon Young, is applying for her Commercial Driver’s License to join him n the road) -- NY, USA - The WSJ. by LORETTA CHAO - May 19, 2015
Labels: drivers' shortage, truckers shortage
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