Truck Driver Shortage in 2022

We care about plenty of things related to the transportation industry here at K-Way Express Inc., and one of the most important things we look at is the shortage of truck drivers around the country.

We are an LTL trucking and logistics company that likes to stay on top of the inflow of data and information about the industry to the best of our ability. One way we make this happen is by looking at what is going on in different sectors of the trucking industry. Right now, the driver shortage is a primary concern. 

Driver Shortage Continues

Plenty of industries are facing a shortage of workers right now. In fact, it is so common for companies to have worker shortages that there are jokes made about how “no one wants to work”. However, for business owners, these don’t feel like jokes, they are reality.

We have personally witnessed the many open truck driver positions and seemingly no one available to fill them. Sadly, the driver shortage has remained one of the most persistent out there.

We can no longer project when some of these jobs will be filled, and there is grave concern that some roles simply won’t be filled at all in the near future. 

Job Losses Continue 

The trucking industry continues to face struggles when it comes to both attracting and maintaining workers. Plenty of people don’t want to necessarily take on the tough job that is trucking. They don’t want to be apart from their families for an extended period of time. That is something that doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon. 

In the month of September 2022, there were more than 11,000 trucking jobs lost as the industry continues to struggle to figure out how to keep the drivers that it has managed to recruit. It certainly feels like many companies are simply trying to do the best they can to hold on to what they have and hope for the best. 

Attracting New Drivers Means Offering More Incentives

The tough lesson for some companies out of all of this is that the only way they can attract more drivers to power their fleet forward is to offer even better incentives than what they already provide. This means considering things like: 

• Better pay
• Sign on bonuses
• Excellent health insurance
• PTO
• More flexible schedules

The list goes on from there, but it is the only way that many companies are holding on to what they have at all at this time. It seems like some of them are frustrated by the lack of progress they have had with recruiting new people, but there are few options when the landscape of the industry is as competitive as it is right now.

The best thing to do is simply make yourself the best carrier in the industry and hope that people will respond to that. It is a great way to make it easier for people to want to stay with you when you do that.