Drivers Hard to Find as Freight Volume Grows

The economy’s growing recovery is beginning to tighten the market for truck drivers, according to industry statistics and recent interviews with fleet owners and managers.

The tightening labor market, seen in rising turnover rates and more difficulty finding qualified drivers, suggests a revival of the truckload industry’s chronic driver shortage, which vanished during the 2001 recession, when the economy stumbled and trucking staggered.

“The demographics that created the driver shortage haven’t changed,” said David Goodson, former editor of the National Survey of Driver Wages and now an industry consultant. Goodson said not enough new young drivers are coming into the industry and that the shortage appeared to be over in 2001 only because the recession cut the demand for trucking services so severely.