Chronic underutilization of American truck drivers — not a truck driver shortage — was the central theme of testimony by David Correll, a research scientist and lecturer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Center for Transportation and Logistics, before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee on Nov. 17, 2021.
Correll told lawmakers that based on his research team’s analysis of trucker ELDs, he estimated that American long-haul, full-truckload drivers spend an average of 6.5 hours of their maximum 11-hour federally regulated working day driving their trucks.
“This implies that 40% of America’s trucking capacity is left on the table every day,” he said at the time. “My research leads me to see the current situation not so much as a head count shortage of drivers, but rather an endemic undervaluing of our American truck drivers’ time.”
FreightWaves asked Correll for his progress assessment of the Biden administration and lawmakers in dealing with truck driver issues.
FREIGHTWAVES: At the House hearing over 18 months ago, you testified that you didn’t think the country could afford ‘to let a crisis go to waste, especially not this one,’ referring to your research that revealed chronic underutilization of truck drivers. So, are we letting this crisis go to waste?
CORRELL: I wouldn’t call it a waste. I was quite encouraged in that testimony to see how policymakers were interested in the trucking issues that I and others on the panel talked about.
Following that hearing, there were actions taken by the administration to help improve training for truck drivers, and there were a couple of policy statements from the White House regarding the work conditions for truck drivers.
FREIGHTWAVES: But isn’t it one thing to put out a policy statement and another to actually take action?
CORRELL: That’s a fair assessment. When my research comes up in different venues, I’ve never had anyone say, “That’s old news, everything’s fixed.”
But I will say it was kind of a miracle moment, sitting with my kids and watching the president’s press conference where he mentioned my research — that’s more progress than a guy like me can expect. My only pause is, they didn’t jump on some of my prescriptions for fixing the problem.
FREIGHTWAVES: Such as?
CORRELL: One of the things I think the government could do that would really help would be to organize information about all the nodes in American supply chains — starting with pickup and delivery points — and give them an A to D health rating similar to what the department of sanitation does with sanitation grades to restaurants. Those that got drivers in and out quickly would get the highest grades. It could also include things like basic amenities for drivers — is there a bathroom, a breakroom?
The virtue of that solution is that once those grades are out there, they can influence the prices that carriers charge to serve those facilities. I think when people see those prices go up, that provides incentive to take respect for drivers’ time and their dignity more seriously.
FREIGHTWAVES: Speaking of data and transportation efficiency, four months after your testimony the Biden administration launched its Freight Logistics Optimization Works (FLOW) data exchange, a government effort to pool information about incoming ocean containers and intermodal equipment from various transportation modes, including trucks. Does FLOW help address the driver detention time issue you found in your research?
CORRELL: I think the FLOW project does endeavor to address some of the same supply chain issues. I’m not involved in the project so I can’t say how much progress it’s making; I talked to someone a few weeks ago who is; they said they’re getting big companies to partner on it. But my read on it is, it’s a hard thing to say to a company, ‘Give us your operational data which reveals how your company is working, warts and all, just because we want it.’ As a researcher I have that same challenge. But FLOW is definitely a step in the right direction.
FREIGHTWAVES: I wanted to ask about other regulatory and legislative efforts since your testimony. For example, how do you view the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s pilot program for 18-to-20-year-old drivers, which could eventually lead to changing the law to allow young people under 21 to haul freight interstate?
CORRELL: That is not the prescription I would offer to address this [driver inefficiency] problem. What we found in our analysis of the ELD data is that the existing community of truck drivers’ time is being squandered. So to me, lowering the driver age says, let’s find more people and similarly squander their time. To me that really misses the opportunity to practice supply chain management more effectively.
Now, there are debates over whether 18-year-olds should drive a long-haul truck — I don’t have unique insight into that question. But I do have insight into the fact that there is already low-hanging fruit where we can do better by America’s truck drivers and run the country’s supply chain more efficiently at the same time.
FREIGHTWAVES: What about the Biden administration’s registered apprenticeship program under the Department of Labor?
CORRELL: One thing I’ve found with conversations I’ve had with experienced drivers is that newer drivers are not getting the training they need. Opening up that on-the-job training experience can make drivers more comfortable as they learn from others how to set up their life and their workweek when they enter employment. So I think these apprenticeship and mentorship programs might be the missing link of communication and information that can help keep these newer drivers in the profession by learning how to be successful early on from experienced drivers.
FREIGHTWAVES: Owner-operator-backed legislation would repeal the overtime exemption currently provided to trucking companies, which would open the door to required overtime pay. Are you in favor?
CORRELL: I’m very much in support of that effort. There are two things about the way truck drivers are managed that are out of date: one, they do not qualify for overtime pay, and two, that they’re paid by the mile. These have always struck me as anachronistic and part of the problem, so efforts to correct this notion that overtime pay doesn’t apply to truck drivers I really think would help.
I also very much support the effort to require shippers and receivers to provide restroom facilities. I love researching drivers, and the hardest part in talking with them is when you hear grown men and women talk about how they’re treated, particularly with regard to bathroom facilities. It’s unsettling. It seems a strange thing for people to have to take on and fight for, but it really is needed.
Related articles:
- Repeated routes reduce driver dwell time at shippers, MIT researcher says
- Regulators seek better data and technology on driver detention
- What lawmakers intend to do about driver detention
Click for more FreightWaves articles by John Gallagher.
Kari Wilson
Problem here occurs when a congress member creates laws for a industry that they have never actually worked in.
We need truckers to solve truckers problems.
ROBERT DIERKS
You won’t have to worry about detention if the roadways keep failing. Arizona I 40 from California to Arizona scales can’t even stay in seat. From there to Flagstaff the state has not fix this in the first 60 mile since President Bush was in office. Won’t have to worry about electric trucks thru Gere as it will fall apart or ground out.
Troy Scott
The figure of 6.5 hours being used is somewhat misleading. My wife has been a driver for 20+ years. If a driver starts the 14 hour clock, drives 30 minutes to their delivery, then it takes 8 hours to unload and reload the 14 hour clock cannot be stopped. Even if they slept this 8 hours they must stop and take a 10 hour break after the 14. This happens pretty regularly and was one of the main reasons she gave up trucking.
Howard Duncan, Jr.
With regards to the federal bureaucracy claiming in sufficient data to validate driver detention time at shipping and receiving locations, the electronic data record generated by the regulatory E. L. D. mandate in over-the-road tractor trucks is proof enough. The record cannot be tampered with, and therefore; the record should pass the evidence test.
If you talk to most older over-the-road truck drivers, the shipping and receiving docks of businesses use uncompensated truck detention time to financially benefit their business. For example, if a tractor-trailer truck is docked to be loaded and the product has not been produced or the orders have not been pulled to be loaded or there is not enough equipment and personnel to unload inbound freight, that truck and driver is being held at the dock because of poor warehouse management. If time is money, the motor carrier and driver are losing money because that time could be utilized moving freight overland to generate cartage revenue.
In closing, the Interstate Commerce Commission of the U. S. government before it was closed had regulations in place to stop detention time abuse by shippers and receivers.
Frank
Drive time hours are squandered mostly due to shippers making drivers wait for loading and unloading. It’s not unusual to see trucks lined up outside a shipper waiting to get loaded or unloaded.
If drivers could pause the ELD during wait times drivers could better manage their hours. Wait times eat up the 14 hour rule and eventually eat up drive time.
Give drivers more flexibility in managing their hours.
Richard Davis
No! Washington is not stepping up for truck drivers. They are hindering truck drivers ability to make money and the safety on the roads. The problems in trucking don’t need a rocket scientist to fix them, it is an easy fix. Truck drivers need to be paid for all their hours worked. That is mainly the hour’s sitting at a dock waiting on other to do their job. As it is now, most drivers only get paid when they are going down the road. When shippers and receivers are required to pay for every hour a truck sits at their dock it does a couple things. First, trucks will be in and out faster. Second, more freight gets picked up and delivered with the same trucks and drivers.
RT
Drivers need places to park at the facilities they are picking up from and going to and delivering at. Even if it’s on the road outside of the facilities. The local police often harass and intimidate drivers to move when they need to be resting. Why? You ordered it. When I gets there you need to let them rest and wait on cite. It steals time of the driver when they can’t. And time is money.
Robert Austin
As a former Driver I can understand the frustration of the drivers who have to deal with the miss management of the drivers daily routines involving wasted hours at shippers and receivers especially in grocery warehouse deliveries where they hold you hostage for up to 10 hours to unload and charge a fee too remove their product I myself can drive 10.75 hrs a day all I would hope for was a decent place to stop for a good home cooked meal and replenish my body and mind after battling the road warrior’s trying to get around those slow moving trucks delivering all of our high priced garbage that fill the landfills to capacity I enjoyed working as a driver but the ever increasing demand for faster cars and slower trucks will only increase the amount of anger and the increased dissatisfaction of CDL drivers to put in a full day of safe and efficient work ethics can only be done by creating a twenty first century transportation system removing the wasteful automobile that carries mostly one person at a time and usually creates the bottleneck hi ways seen every morning and evening stop wasting the taxpayer money on outdated and unnecessary mode transportation and bring our great country into a leadership role of moving people and goods efficiently and with dignity to our citizens and the World