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American Trucking Associations released an analysis of the truck driver shortage, concluding that while the shortage is acute and limited to the truckload sector, long-term trends could cause it to explode in the next decade.

“Carriers and fleet executives have begun expressing concern about their ability to identify and hire qualified professional drivers,” ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello said.

“With this report, we tried to identify where the impacts were being felt the most, why the shortage is increasingly worrisome and why it has the potential to get worse,” he said.

“ATA estimates the current shortage of drivers to be in the 20,000 to 25,000 range in the for-hire truckload market . . .�� on a base of roughly 750,000 trucks,” the report said, adding that if current trends continue, the shortage has the potential to grow to 239,000 over the next decade.��

Speakers at a panel last month at ATA’s Management Conference & Exhibition in Las Vegas cited a

In addition to industry growth, retirements and drivers voluntarily changing careers, ATA believes certain government regulations — yet-to-be-implemented hours-of-service changes and the federal government’s Compliance, Safety, Accountability program — will exacerbate the shortage, while the industry’s transition to electronic logging is unlikely to have a significant impact.

(2-pp. PDF)