Fair to assume the driver shortage is real?

There is a shortage because i wouldn't drive for less than 53cpm or 22$ in hour but when i look at their ads on craiglist they talking about professional driver make 0.46cpm top paying job like really. Where i work now im at 0.57cpm nd i aint settle for less.

 

um, where are you getting your facts?

I worked at Burger King for 3 years and the MOST I ever made was $13K/yr. my first "full" year driving a truck (I had to miss like 3 months because I lost a job) I made $26K

$13K≠$26K. Not by any stretch of the imagination.

well, unless the $13K is what you made solo and $26K is what you made as a team.

 

The problem is simple, drivers are leaving faster than they can be replaced. and to be honest this isn't a trucking problem this happens everywhere

to add to the problem the freight levels are starting to go up so that complicates things

and I don't buy this "nobody in their 20's is applying for OTR jobs"....I applied for my first OTR job at 21. and turned down a few non-OTR jobs that summer I was unemployed (I wanted OTR. I didn't want anything local, regional or home weekends/nights etc) One might assume "yea but you grew up with a trucking family right?"

*laughs* that's hillarious

 

I got my first job when i was 21 with werner otr 0.26cpm nd 62mph i was just young nd dumb stick with them for a few years then i went to their terminal in allentown nd i call them up nd be like listen im taking a leave of absence they i wasn't coming back.

 

For many years there have been carriers who receive money from the government to train new drivers. They not only make money from the training, but also have the services of the driver for next to nothing in payroll. When I started we didn't have truck driving schools. Companies hired people, gave them the keys, bills and cash for fuel and you went out and earned a living. The government was not paying carriers to train people. They absorbed those costs themselves. As long as these carriers are paid to train new drivers, we will be told that there is a driver shortage. There is an incentive to have turnover. When you look at the raw numbers it may appear that there is a shortage. Throw a figure like 20,000 drivers needed and it sounds like a real shortage. When you look at the total number of drivers or trucks and do the math, there really isn't a shortage. But, it makes good press. The money will continue to flow as long as there appears to be a shortage. I would like to see carriers go back to training their own drivers without having the benefit of being subsidized by our tax dollars. Before the subsidies, I think we had a higher level of drivers. Companies did not have the incentive to run as many people through their training program as possible. They did what was necessary to get their drivers working and did what they could to keep them. There was turnover. That hasn't changed other than the percentages. We have always had turnover. Part of the difference is drivers and their attitudes. When I started drivers had more of a "can do" attitude. Today, we seem to have more whiners who are more interested in where they won't go than earning a good living.

 

A- to the -men, brother.

 

If these companies short of drivers paid decent, guess what, they wouldn't be short of drivers.

 

the reason why the pay isn't all that great is 1) economical 2) logical

The cost of operating a truck is going up and up and up, the cost of freight is getting lower or remaining the same so its creating problems. a Trucking company makes money doing 1 thing and 1 thing only that is moving freight. (and yes I do know that companies have self-sponsored schools and sell trucks on the side, but how much money do you really make selling a $3000 education for $1500-$3000?. and selling trucks on the side probably isn't that much money in the grand scheme of things) and since freight is getting cheaper that creates a mess

CEO's and other executives are REQUIRED to get pay raises every year it says right there in their contract. They also get a percentage of the companies profit for that year/quarter. If they don't get their money then you have a breach of contract and it usually doesn't end well.

Ever year permits, fees, taxes, tolls, insurance, etc. go up in price.

Trucks are breaking down often, the cost of repairs is going up as well. Shop minimums are always changing. almost everything is 1 hour labor minimum. ($50-$150/hr) add in the cost of the parts and other repairs and you can see how quickly this adds up. to add to this many companies are cutting the hours of their shops on their yards leaving more work to be done at third-party shops. (I have found a cost-cutting measure) and the on-site mechanics that terminals have are paid such an embarrassing wage. they are overworked, underpaid, and more underappreciated than we are. i'll say their work conditions are worse than ours

I dont' know how dispatchers are paid, but I assume like most everyone else they also get pay raises every year (as invisible as they are) and they also have a high turnover. everything is THEIR fault and they get blamed for it. Drivers also don't respect dispatchers so there is no point in trying. Turnover is high so whats the point?

so, with all these costs going up somebody has to take the hit (simple math) so that leaves the drivers. 1) there are MORE drivers than any other sector in the company. Most big carriers have a 30:1 driver/dispatcher ratio which says a lot right there. 2) with a 90-110% turnover rate what is the point of paying the drivers if they are going to leave anyway? Accountants and other higher-ups read this and all they read is that number. well, the odds aren't in your favor. The articles may mention why there is a turnover but the companies don't think they are the problem and assume its all driver. There is no reason a company should pay its driver $80K (I made that number up) if he/she will be gone within a year. that's a waste of their time and their money.

if we can decrease turnover I believe that pay will go up. Companies are more willing to pay drivers who will stay than drivers who are not going to

Up top the company has ALOT of people to answer to, more than we can even imagine. We don't have as many people to answer to. and yes I know we do have people to answer to the company doesn't care, just like we don't care who they answer to. People are naturally greedy and selfish so that makes us look worse than we really are.

you are on bottom looking on top so it makes no sense. if we were on top this would make complete sense.

 

90-110% turnover rate...pay isn't going up any time soon