Why is the US importing truck drivers?
The American trucking industry today is in trouble. Wages have flatlined for decades, while deadly accidents have steadily increased. Both of these trends share the same root cause: the massive influx of cheap, poorly trained, foreign-born drivers.
It didn’t have to be this way.
When the COVID lockdowns hit in 2020, the industry went through a very brief demand collapse as businesses closed and people lost their jobs. At the same time, people with “email jobs” began working from home, and the government started handing out “free” money to those out of work.
This is when online shopping exploded; all at once, truckers were more in demand than ever.
By 2021, this had translated to incredible pay rates, which caused many people with a commercial driver’s license to re-enter the business.
Even while doing its usual fatuous whining about the supposed “shortage” of truck drivers, the American Trucking Associations had to admit that its own research revealed that there were 10 million people in the United States with an active CDL.
It was all a fine example of the market operating as it should. Naturally, the government had to get involved and create a problem where there wasn’t one.
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I have always appreciated truck drivers delivering goods and services to Americans. They became more exposed to average Americans when others began using radios to communicate with other drivers. I recall listening to the chatter when I installed one of the devices in a van I bought to hall my kids and their stuff around. While I liked driving the van I have more recently gone with a Ford pickup truck that also gets fairly decent gas mileage. I built a home out in the country and the truck was invaluable in getting some material to the work site. I still use the truck.
See also:
Highway to hell: Mass influx of foreign-born truckers cause carnage on American roads
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