In the border town of Windsor, a city with nearly double-digit unemployment, a recruiter with 100 available job openings sat alone in an empty room Thursday inside the 400 City Hall Square building.
But such is the state of the trucking industry, which faces an acute shortage of drivers, Windsor Star reporter, Dave Battagello, comments after patrolling a local driver job fair.
“People don’t want to drive anymore,” Rebecca Wismer, a recruiter from Kee Human Resources, which hosted the job fair and represents about 50 companies.
“If I had 800 jobs locally I might be able to fill them in an instant, but guys don’t want to cross the border. The younger generation is not getting into trucking,” she told the Star.
As of noon, six people came to the job fair — in a city with a 9.5 unemployment rate — expressing interest as a driver with the required AZ qualifications for the openings.
“That’s six drivers I can put to work on Monday,” Wismer said. “That’s pretty good.”
The dynamics of the industry have changed greatly — very few will take work as a long-haul driver that might require being on the road for 14 days, off for a couple, then back on the road again, she said.
A large majority of drivers want to be home with their families every night.
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The industry is facing a “demographic tsunami,” said David Bradley, CEO of the Canadian Trucking Alliance.
“We have the oldest workplace in the country,” he said. “Trucking companies are not getting their fair share of people under 30 into the industry.
“It’s a difficult job for some people. Where the shortage is most acute is the long-distance market. It’s hard to convince people to spend that amount of time away from home.”
A long distance driver can earn between $70,000 and $80,000 annually, but that’s not enough incentive, Bradley said.
Driver compensation and quality of life for truckers has to improve or nothing will change, Bradley said. But that means consumers are going to have to pay more at the register for food and other transported goods.
“The industry is hyper-competitive to keep prices down for customers and that has not allowed wages to move up,” Bradley said.
The labour shortage is a frequent topic of conversation among drivers, says Syphasouk (Steve) Sayaphet of Windsor, who has driven truck for 19 years.
“We talk about it, how we pick and choose,” he said. “You look for better trucks — new trucks or trailers. You don’t want to sit on the side of the road if the truck breaks down. You lose so much time — sometimes 20 hours.”
“The money is good,” he said. “It’s fair enough.”
