Driver Shortage Enters 39th Consecutive Year, Industry Stunned Once Again
Experts who have predicted the shortage every year since 1987 say they never saw it coming.
The trucking industry was rocked this week by the shocking news that it still does not have enough drivers, a development insiders describe as "completely unprecedented, apart from every previous year."
The shortage, first reported in a fax that is now framed in the lobby of the fictional Canadian Council of Saying the Same Thing, has now outlasted three recessions, two currencies of fuel card and every single dispatcher's patience.
"We were blindsided," said Lorne Tarmac-Whitby, a made-up fleet executive who has delivered the same keynote on the topic 212 times. "We offered competitive pay. By competitive, I mean we compete hard to keep it where it was in 2004."
Root causes remain a mystery
Industry researchers have spent decades trying to work out why people are reluctant to spend three weeks away from home, sleep in a parking lot beside a reefer unit, wait unpaid for six hours at a shipper and then be told by an app that they were "late."
"It's a puzzle," said Tarmac-Whitby. "We put a pizza party in the budget. Twice."
A task force has been struck to study the issue. Its first recommendation is to strike another task force, which is expected to report back in 2041 with a PowerPoint deck that says "retention" on slide four in 72-point font.
Solutions on the table
Proposals currently under consideration include:
- Calling the problem a "driver opportunity" instead
- A new LinkedIn post every Tuesday reminding everyone that drivers are "the backbone of the economy"
- Raising pay (tabled for further discussion, then quietly removed from the agenda)
- A commemorative mug
Meanwhile, drivers interviewed at a fictional truck stop outside Napanee said there is no shortage of drivers, only a shortage of reasons to stay.
"I'll come back the day detention time is paid on time and the truck stop has a parking spot after 6 p.m.," said a driver who identified himself only as "Big Steve, Probably."
At press time, the industry had announced that the shortage would be the focus of next year's conference, the year after's conference and, tentatively, the conference in 2087.