Trucking Employment Is Contracting The Fastest On Record This Century

The following chart came from an economist comparing the "employment index" in 2023 (the red line) to the past major downturns we had in 2000 (Tech Stock Collapse) and 2008 (Great Financial Crisis). Apparently hiring is way, way down this year.

Here is the chart:

Obviously, finding work right now in trucking is far more difficult than it was historically, but it all goes in cycles, and things will soon enough return to normal.

I'd love to know how everyone is doing for miles? Are you guys still running hard?

I’ve seen a little slow down, but not much. My company is very stable and hauls a lot of meat. It seems their market stays pretty steady.

I just calculated my miles for the past 12 months, October through September.. My average was 3181 over 52 weeks, but I also took about 4 weeks of vacation.

This past week I drove 2702 over 7 days, so that was a slower than normal week, but next week might be 3800.

I am also getting more assignments with 2 stops, which is due, I think, to a downturn in shipping volume so the company adds another stop to fill up the trailer when necessary.

And the company keeps hiring, bringing in about 6 new drivers to orientation every week. (We have roughly 300+ drivers and about 400 trucks). Some of that is due to attrition, but some is just due to demand.

Things seem to be steady in the refrigerated sector, just from what I see.

Coincidentally, just after seeing this thread, I saw a report on the news that said Tyson had issued a negative outlook for sales based on weakening demand for meat. The report said that Tyson’s workforce is down 3% in the US from one year ago and 6% internationally.

I don’t think we’ve seen the bottom yet and may not see it for quite some time.

Tyson and Smithfield have been closing plants all over the country...droughts are being blamed for low produce and beef production. We are importing more beef now than before. There is a blueberry shortage so some drivers are fighting for those loads hoping for better rates.

I am amazed to hear Bruce's number. The same is not true for reefer here... and several of my reefer friends are in the same boat at other companies. Average week seems to be more like 2200.with occasional high miles. This week prime has a deficit of 1400 loads. More people seem to be around 1800 the past couple weeks than higher.

Last week was a rough one. Load for 0100 Monday canceled. I received another load assignment for 12 hrs later to repower a load. That load was canceled. I was given a couple trailer moves to keep me busy that amounted to about 4 hrs of work.

Parked at rest area Monday night at 2300. No load Tuesday morning. No load Tuesday night. No load Wed morning.

Got a load assignment for 20:45 Wed night at Amazon. Arrived to pick up load. Load had been canceled. Went back to rest area to park. Got a call asking me to go back to Amazon for a load at 2300. Arrived to pick up new load. Load had been canceled. Went to rest area to park.

Got a load assignment on Thursday morning to repower a load for 0800 Friday morning. Drove to relay location and had about 14hrs to kill while waiting on driver to arrive with loaded trailer.

Did the repower Friday morning. Dove 160 miles to delivery location. Dropped load. Went hone for the weekend.

That was by far the slowest week I've ever had. I have a PTO day today. Hopefully this week will be a lot better than last.

I switched back to OTR from a dedicated local. I simply couldn't stand the hours of local coupled with sitting in Denver traffic for 10 hours a day.

Since then I've had 3000 to 3700 mile weeks with the exception of a few days for breakdown and a few for a B service. This week concluding today will be light at 2700 mikes because of the service and the last dispatch on it is a 1700 mile trip. But it will have some ancillary to compensate. I should be on track for 12k miles for the month.

My results are not typical from what im seeing and hearingfrom many of our other drivers. There's only a couple drivers at my terminal getting that kind of volume. But the market crash is showing in other ways as well.

You must now maintain a smartdrive score of 15 or lower instead of 25. To put it context, one single event on the camera can now eliminate the safety bonus and consequently kicker bonus, taking out 3 cpm on all your miles for the month. My score is typically 0 to 4 per month, so I'm not too worried, but with the smartdrive, it frequently records ghost braking events as well as other ones. About once a month I have to have my DM adjust and audit the thing. Very few of our drivers are getting the full bonus which is 8 cpm on all miles for the month.

Another item where it shows up is that it's getting increasingly difficult to get ancillary pay. Breakdown, layover etc. Again, they seem to prefer to keep me moving so I'm not seeing it but my DM told me that they are being pushed to reduce non milage pay.

I don't know if it's related or not, but I had applied to a new company, in doing so, obviously that company would have contacted knight for information, which I. Turn could have put a bit of extra motivation on knight. The offer is still open with the other company, but given the market volatility and that many smaller carriers are going belly up, I think I'm pretty safe and getting good miles where I'm at. It could be coincidence but Knight seems to bend over backwards to make sure I'm taken care of. Higher cpm doesn't always equate to more money per week, month or year, I have a lot of soft perks where I'm at.

PFG is going strong, still busy and growing. We are always hiring, recently added a few more shuttle drivers as well.

Talked with my mentor from CRST, he was telling me, since they quit training drivers, they let go the staff at the terminal. 2 safety directors, and counter help. Kept 1 older lady (dumber than a box of rocks) and another guy. They moved out of the Riverside terminal to one in Ontario, Cal. Gardners, moved into the old terminal (HUGE) and their name was changed to something else. Which they just bought up some trucking company in Dallas as well.

The cafe and game room, movie room, laundry room etc all been cleaned out for offices? Dunno why they have plenty of office spaces, plus the orientation room. Don't know what they plan to do with all those dorm rooms (100+) Said were becoming offices, but not now. Kinda dumb to get rid of space drivers could use !

He pulls dedicated for R&L had some changes, due to load cancels, got diverted a couple times to different loads. But still pulling down the miles. Sucks they terminated a lot of office staff by Dec 15th ! And he said with his inside connects, they even said, NO ONE had any advanced warning, of those changes, til the last minute. hmmmmm

Back in June, I had calculated a 358 mile (average weekly) drop. I'd estimated it would result in a $10,000/yr drop in pay. Things continued to get worse. Fortunately, for the rest of the drivers at my company, I found a different (non-trucking) job and have left the road.

Yesterday, a close friend who drives for the same company I left, said he finished last week with 1,700 miles. He's a driver that has been with the company ten years, has a great safety record and used to average 2,700+ miles/week.

I'm grateful for this site and all the learning I was able to do before I went to school. While I hope the cycle soon rebounds, I can't say I share that optimism this time around. Many of the people, running the country, are protected from the economic realities the rest of us have to live with. Ergo, they have little incentive to do the things necessary to turn the economy around. Hell, they can't even admit there's a problem, let alone the real causes.

Anyway, I hope I'm wrong and I'm still grateful for this site, Brett, Old School, Errol and all the others who've helped make my Trucking experience the top-notch experience it was.

Keep the shiny side up folks. :)

Steve L.,

Sorry to read that you have moved on. Times are tough right now but there has been ups and downs in trucking for as long as I can remember.

The recession and fuel shortages back in the 70's caused me a couple of jobs but I was able to find another job and even some part time work to supplement the lean times.

Good luck in whatever you do and don't be a stranger here at TT.