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Driver Pay Should Double, Declares Freightliner's CEO
Pay for over-the-road truck drivers and owner/operators is getting better as fleets attempt to raise freight rates this year, but "a 5% rate increase and 2 to 3 cents a mile going to the driver is not nearly enough," Jim Hebe, Freightliner Corp.'s president and CEO, declared recently.
"Doubling driver pay is more like it," he said, if trucking companies are to keep drivers and attract new ones. Drivers deserve much more than they now make for the hours they work, the hassles they face and their importance to the economy. Better wages, benefits and working conditions will also attract technicians to maintain and repair trucks, Hebe said.
This approach has enabled Freightliner dealers to hire hundreds of new mechanics to expand their shops. About 4,500 techs now work at dealers and another 850 at TravelCenters of America as TAs gear up to augment service of Freightliner trucks under the Freightliner ServicePoint agreement announced a year ago.
Lack of drivers is a major reason for a big slowdown in orders for new Class 8 trucks, Hebe and other industry execs say. Last year's all-time high of more than 262,000 will fall to between 210,000 and 220,000 this year, then below 210,000 in 2001, because fleets are already parking existing trucks for which they can't find drivers. Another factor is low residual values of used trucks, which fleets may keep instead of trading.
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