University of Arkansas Student Gathering Insight on Driver Shortage

Trucking rolls on money.

IF the rig is not loaded and moving, there is no money to be made. Truckers put in 70 hours a week, most of the time WAY more than that when accounting for unlogged time being awake waiting on something related to the work. That's almost twice what a 40 hour weeker will do.

Wages worked out to less than half minimum wage sometimes in our time. That is for two drivers (A husband and wife team) working 140 hours a week. There is 168 total hours in a week.

Training is not comprehensive. You will visit a trucking school and spend some time watching the people. Say 4 students with a truck going around some barrels at idle speed. Ha. They learn just enough to get the CDL license via road trip without killing anyone.

However the education has just begun. The first year of the industry for the newbie is the most dangerous. They make a mistake, run over something or hit the truck and break it somewhere costing company money. They get dismissed for preventable accident which is recorded. Sometimes it's severe enough they are essentially out of the industry via DAC reports and other databases that maintain records on really bad drivers.

Finally for every 100 people going to trucking school today, about 20 will make it to 5 years and beyond. Everyone else has been eliminated either from working in trucking, or they discover it's not for them or... they are injured and or killed. Or... they do drugs and are eliminated from the industry. Or... arrested and imprisioned. Or or or.

There is no golden age other than the wartime years in world war one post era and the world war two era. Eisenhower's Interstate System project in the 50's is the greatest human public works ever since the Pyramids. The last sections were not completed until almost 2000.

If you are never in a position to touch a 18 wheeler and live in one while running the USA in all weather, all days of the years (Holidays do not stop for frreight...) and all types of terrain, including off road and so on. You will not have a true knowledge of what it takes to do this.

I am just me. There is no other me. The things Ive done and seen over my life time on the trucking side is just me. And most of it is literally passing into history, not being done anymore in some ways. Other things never really changed such as say 4.5 miles to gallon with a 1960's era mack to only 6.5 with a 120K dollar freightliner century. Retail on tractors now cost 150K

Government changes and rules are just about ready to eliminate all trucks with no computer support. Essentially ban them. Either through outright law banning or via emissions and computer support requirments. The micromanagement and losses of the so called Captian of the ship freedoms continue.

Finally but not least, to me the most important problem other than pay in this industry is the slow pace of shippers and recievers who DO NOT respect the Professional Trucker'\s own time. His or her hours of service has no meaning to a shipper or receiver. So that trucker is trapped in a form of mobile warehousing. I managed to select employers such as McKesson of Memphis to haul very specialized extremely high dollar medical loads to avoid all shippers and recievers that waste my time. I go to a city distribution point, back in. get unloaded and reloaded with cardboard waste straight back to Memphis in one hour tops from anywhere in the USA east of Denver every morning. There is no waste or loss or problems in that kind of high dollar hauling. No one has time for that.

Finally being a team is a ultimate work around for our obsolete HOS laws and other limitations against appointment times set by other people who are not driving my truck. They decide that the load will be delivered into New Jersey from LA within 3 days flat. I need two and change 65 hours of that 72 to get that truck to Jersey. ANY problems on our interstates will seriously threaten that kind of just in time. It takes the two of us to get it there in a timely manner.

That is with a restricted 63 mph truck. I can get into Jersey inside of 50 plus hours with a unlimited truck at the speed limits, some of which are 85 now.

Everything else has been written down myself over almost two years here. You can research it all. You will find that you will need a life time to collect all that. There are millions of drivers. They are disposable and replaceable. Sometimes because they are too stupid to do the work correctly and on time. Or even safely.

Again, my views are mine only. Just one driver who has been lucky in life to get as far as I did. And actually to get away with all of this industry with my body mostly intact and my freedom. Things are getting worse in this industry. There are certain things happening that I would not accept at all period in my tractor trailer, driver facing cameras for one. incessant make work friviolus messages is another. Brokers calling every hour saying where you are at. And so on etc. Not acceptable. So I become a sort of a outcast in a way. A dinosaur. Im glad the good years have gone by when I was around when we did our bit in trucking without all that modern technological micromanagement. It's absurd.

In a way the drivers have brought it onto themselves. And the companies as well as shippers and recievers share a part of that blame as well.

My post might seem a angry one. It's totally not. I am medically retired. The body has failed over time from driving when I was 21 trucks without any airride, aka old iron. All metal with sometimes bare steel interiors in winter. It's cold at -30. But I was young and strong. Fast forward to past 50, all the fancy trucks today cannot give my body a good ride due to a variety of medical losses in wear and tear on the skeleton and other organs within it. There is no point. That's why I do not drive. I pretty much was lost to the industry probably at least 25 years of more service with potential earnings approaching 120K or more each of those years. That's lost forever to the area I live in. In fact I have become a parasite of sorts to the Nation on social security way before 65. It's part of having been broken down by work and disability. I do not like it at all. But it is what it is.

No regrets.

 

OP, ask your college friends how much money would they need to make to become truck drivers. I am really curious what do young kids think about this

 

lol you'll fit right in around here!

 

Im going to take a shot at Arkansas. Forgive me for saying so... If anything is going to happen it's gots to be right here in this state. I know that sometimes things happen only in Arkansas... but Ive learned to live with it. It sure beats the hell out of the stuffy yankee gals back home in Maryland whoo ee.

 

There is NO driver shortage. Plenty of drivers are available, if it paid enough. Ever take economics 101? It is supply and demand.

 

I used to say that but have you noticed the doubling of trucks on the road in the last 10 years? Factor in retirement and all the other factors that move drivers out, with the ever-increasing demand, I can see how it is becoming a problem.

 

There is a shortage of drivers who drive at night. Every night I see the truckstops and rest areas full to overflowing with big trucks. For my little naps I have to use onramps.

 

No,there is a shortage of shippers and receivers working at night.
I love driving at night without all that traffic but not when I still have to do deliveries and pick ups during the day.

 

Low wages
Over regulated,,one of the few jobs on the planet where regulators constantly trying to fleece your wages