You’ve seen the headlines for years. You’ve see the desperate “We’re Hiring!” banners slapped on the back of every semi-truck on the interstate or bun in the streets. The narrative is pounded into our heads: America is running out of drivers, and the supply chain is one bad week away from collapsing.
But if you dig into the hard numbers—past the lobbyist press releases and into the boring spreadsheets at the Bureau of Labor Statistics—a very different picture emerges.
The reality? We aren’t running out of people who know how to drive. We are running out of people willing to put up with the lifestyle for the price being offered.
Here is the breakdown of what is actually happening on America’s roads.
First, a Quick Econ Lesson (I Promise It’s Painless)
To understand the mess, you have to define “shortage.”
- To a boss: A shortage means “I can’t find anyone to work for ‘x’ wage”
- To an economist: A shortage means “Even if I raise pay and improve conditions, there literally aren’t enough humans to do the work.”
Most researchers agree that the driver crisis is the first one. When pay goes up, people show up. When pay (or conditions) stagnate, people leave. That’s not a shortage; that’s a market telling you your job offer isn’t good enough.
1. Freight Trucking: The “Bucket with a Hole” Problem
This is the big one. The American Trucking Associations (ATA) claims the industry is short 60,000 to 80,000 drivers. It sounds terrifying.
But here is the twist: There are more truck drivers today than ever before.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were about 3.06 million truck drivers employed in 2024. That is at or near record highs. So, where is the panic coming from?
The Turnover Trap The problem isn’t recruiting; it’s retention. In the long-haul sector (those big 18-wheelers you see driving cross-country):
- Drivers are often away from home for weeks.
- They are usually paid by the mile (which means if they are stuck in traffic or waiting at a dock, they are working for free).
- The turnover rate at large carriers averages 94%.
Imagine hiring 100 people in January and needing to replace 94 of them by December. That is what these companies are dealing with. They don’t have a hiring problem; they have a “bucket with a hole” problem.
As one economist put it, the labor market for truckers works just fine—it’s just that the job is really hard, and people quit to go work in construction or warehousing where they can sleep in their own beds every night.
2. The Yellow Bus Crisis: A Real, Actual Shortage
While the trucking shortage is debatable, the school bus driver shortage is painfully real.
If you are a parent, you’ve probably felt this. Routes cancelled. Delays. Panic. The numbers back you up:
- As of August 2025, there were 21,200 fewer school bus drivers than there were in 2019.
- That’s a 9.5% decline.
Why is this happening? It’s the “split shift” nightmare. You work two hours in the morning, have four hours of unpaid dead time in the middle of the day, and then work two hours in the afternoon. It’s hard to make a living on that, even with a CDL.
Plus, during COVID, many older drivers (the backbone of the school bus workforce) retired or left due to health risks and never came back. Even though districts are raising pay (wages are up ~4.2%), it hasn’t been enough to fill the seats. This is a legitimate structural shortage.
3. Public Transit: The Death Spiral
City buses and subways are facing the same grim math as school buses.
- 96% of transit agencies reported workforce shortages recently.
- 84% said it was forcing them to cut service.
This creates a nasty feedback loop: The agency is short-staffed -> existing drivers have to work forced overtime -> existing drivers burn out and quit -> the agency is even more short-staffed.
Drivers who used to view a city bus job as a “golden ticket” with a pension are now looking at delivery jobs that pay similar cash with way less stress and fewer angry passengers.
4. Uber & Lyft: The “Gig” Is Doing Just Fine
Remember when you couldn’t get an Uber in 2021? That’s over. Uber reported a record 6.5 million active drivers/couriers globally recently. In cities like NYC, regulators have found there is absolutely no shortage of drivers—in fact, wait times are low.
The complaints here aren’t about “where are the drivers?” The complaints are from the drivers asking, “where is the money?” But in terms of bodies in seats? The gig economy is fully stocked.
The Verdict
So, is there a driver shortage?
If you are a trucking CEO: Yes. It is incredibly hard to find people willing to live on the road for weeks at a time for $57k a year. If you are a School Superintendent: Yes. You literally cannot find people to drive the busses.
We have plenty of licensed drivers in America. We just have a shortage of jobs that offer the pay, dignity, and work-life balance required to keep them behind the wheel.
Until the job quality improves, those “Help Wanted” signs aren’t going anywhere.
