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ATA Begins Surveying for 2026 Driver Compensation Study
ATRI Report Shows Compensation Tops Driver Concerns
Key Takeaways:
- American Trucking Associations launched its 2026 Driver Compensation Study survey Jan. 13, seeking carrier and driver participation through March 30.
- The last study showed median 2023 pay rose despite a freight recession, but only 42% of truckload carriers raised wages in the 2024 study.
- Forecasts point to a slow 2026 recovery, with spot rates up 3.6% and contract rates up 2.6%, limiting scope for meaningful driver pay increases.
American Trucking Associations launched its 2026 ATA Driver Compensation Study survey Jan. 13.
The study will include pay estimates by carrier type, trailer type and region. It also will assess driver pay structures including hourly, per-mile, annual salary and percent of revenue as well as various incentives.
Carriers and drivers interested in participating should visit www.surveymonkey.com/r/ATA-Driver-Comp-Survey. The deadline for participation is March 30.
“In this difficult and prolonged freight recession, the companies with the greatest edge are the ones that have the best data. As a one-of-a-kind benchmarking tool, the Driver Compensation Study provides the crucial, actionable intelligence motor carriers need to recruit and retain their most valuable resource: professional truck drivers,” said ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello.
“In order to get as accurate a picture of industry trends as possible, we rely on input from a large cross-section of motor carriers to provide detailed information about their total compensation packages and supply a clear view of how — and how much — trucking companies pay their drivers,” Costello added.
The last ATA Driver Compensation Study found truckload drivers earned median annual pay of $76,420 in 2023, a 10% increase compared with the level reported in 2021’s study.
Less-than-truckload linehaul drivers took home $94,525 in median annual pay and less-than-truckload local drivers were paid $80,680 in 2023.
At that point, the ongoing freight rate recession was underway.
“It’s actually remarkable that [annual pay] went up at all, because the trucking industry was in a freight recession in 2023. It just shows you how much demand there is for good, quality drivers — that their pay went up even when freight volumes were down,” Costello said at the time.
That said, while more than 90% of truckload carriers increased driver pay packets in the 2021 study, only 42% raised wages in the 2024 study.
Compensation Top Driver Concern
Adequate compensation is the top concern among professional drivers in 2025, according to the American Transportation Research Institute’s annual survey.
Compensation replaced parking atop the list of drivers’ concerns, ATRI said Oct. 26 during the unveiling of the study’s results at the American Trucking Associations 2025 Management Conference & Exhibition.
Truck parking was No. 2 in 2025 for drivers. English-language deficiency for drivers, broker issues and detention/delay at customer facilities made up the rest of the top five among the 27 topics to choose from.
Wages rose 2.4% for drivers in the first nine months of 2025, according to ATRI, but that was 0.5% below the rate of inflation.
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(Tempura/Getty Images)
A study commissioned by FinditParts on truck driver job satisfaction saw predictable pay cited by 81% of drivers as the reason for seeking alternative employment.
Speaking on an MCE panel as the study’s results were unveiled, A&M Transport CEO Andy Owens said it was difficult to raise driver wages because of the freight rate recession.
Glendale, Ore.-based truckload carrier A&M Transport operates in five Western states. Owens also is chairman of the ATRI Research Advisory Committee.
“Every carrier in here would love to pay their drivers more. It is just not in the cards at the moment,” Owens said.
Recovery to Be Slow in 2026
Substantial further pay rises are unlikely in 2026, if early prognostications about spot and contract rate levels as well as freight demand in the coming year are anything to go by.
FTR Transportation Intelligence Vice President of Trucking Avery Vise warned during a Jan. 8 webinar that the research group expects truckload spot rates to increase 3.6% in 2026 and contract rates to rise 2.6%.
“Yes, it is technically recovery, but … it’s basically what the inflation rate is right now. So, you know, it’s what we’ve been calling sort of a ‘marginless recovery,’ ” Vise said.
“Until contract rates get considerably north of that, it’s not gonna help carriers very much,” he added. “It’s going to obviously stop the bleeding for a lot of them, but it’s not enough to cover a lot of the obligations that they have, and obviously, in a lot of cases, the debts that they’ve incurred and so on.”
