America has a truck driver shortage
washingtonpost.com
America has a truck driver shortage
1–10 of 404 posts
Re: America has a truck driver shortage
#2I am so sick of this perpetual fallacy about labor shortages. If you can't find enough workers it means you need to raise the price you're offering. (But yasp the article cited one particular firm has already increased prices 15% this year.) Doesn't matter. There is a certain price at which the market will clear. If the market isn't clearing it's because the price being offered is too low. Keep trying.
Re: America has a truck driver shortage
#3Funny that the manager's pay is the only one that's not listed.
It seems to me that truck driving is at the same boring, unhealthy and dangerous. I can't imagine not making serious mistakes if I had to drive on a freeway for 8 hours a day or more.
Re: America has a truck driver shortage
#4If you're an employer and you cant find employees, the answer is virtually always to increase total compensation. Theres no reason $80k is the top end of the pay range for any job.
The economy does not price jobs based on prestige, education level, or some other signal... that's a judgement made by certain people about what they think a job is worth.. not the market. The opinions of people about the worth of a job are irrelevant.
Re: America has a truck driver shortage
#5From the article: A few drivers told The Washington Post that they earn $100,000, but many said their annual pay is less than $50,000 (government statistics say median pay for the industry is $42,000). As for the bonuses, driver Daniel Gollnick said they are a “complete joke” because of all the strings attached.
Yet the headline talks about 80 kUSD/year.
Re: America has a truck driver shortage
#6I am so sick of this perpetual fallacy about labor shortages. If you can't find enough workers it means you need to raise the price you're offering. (But yasp the article cited one particular firm has already increased prices 15% this year.) Doesn't matter. There is a certain price at which the market will clear. If the market isn't clearing it's because the price being offered is too low. Keep trying.
Our economy has split into areas where in some areas "talent" can get almost infinite amounts of money and in other areas it's simply not conceivable to pay people more. I wonder how free market people explain this. Based on the market theories I have heard it doesn't make sense.
Re: America has a truck driver shortage
#7Headline: "Here’s why few want an $80,000 job."
Paragraph 5: "government statistics say median pay for the industry is $42,000."
Well. There's your problem.
Re: America has a truck driver shortage
#8I am so sick of this perpetual fallacy about labor shortages. If you can't find enough workers it means you need to raise the price you're offering. (But yasp the article cited one particular firm has already increased prices 15% this year.) Doesn't matter. There is a certain price at which the market will clear. If the market isn't clearing it's because the price being offered is too low. Keep trying.
Our economy has split into areas where in some areas "talent" can get almost infinite amounts of money and in other areas it's simply not conceivable to pay people more. I wonder how free market people explain this. Based on the market theories I have heard it doesn't make sense.
I don't know much about the trucking industry but I imagine that it is competitive enough where employers don't feel like they have much latitude to pass higher wages along to their customers.
Re: America has a truck driver shortage
#9Becoming a truck driver currently doesn't seem a wise choice when self-driving trucks are on the horizon.
Re: America has a truck driver shortage
#10I am so sick of this perpetual fallacy about labor shortages. If you can't find enough workers it means you need to raise the price you're offering. (But yasp the article cited one particular firm has already increased prices 15% this year.) Doesn't matter. There is a certain price at which the market will clear. If the market isn't clearing it's because the price being offered is too low. Keep trying.
Our economy has split into areas where in some areas "talent" can get almost infinite amounts of money and in other areas it's simply not conceivable to pay people more. I wonder how free market people explain this. Based on the market theories I have heard it doesn't make sense.
It does make sense, you don’t need “infinite” amount of money. Pay a driver $200k a year. Or give them an 8 hour workday, and week off week on schedules so they can see their family.
There’s many solutions, all of them involve incentivizing people to become drivers. If people want their Amazon orders so bad, they’ll end up paying. And if they don’t, then they have to re-prioritize what they want.