How often in the course of trucking history have those who worked in the financial sector — specifically, at a bank — left that career to pick up trucking? Not as a stop-gap measure, either. Rather, as a career to spend possibly decades working in and even to retire in?
Obviously, I don’t have any statistics in front of me that say bankers becoming truckers is an uncommon occurrence. I’m just assuming it’s not, as you probably are.
I do, however, have anecdotal evidence that it’s at least happened once: Bloomberg posted a story this week citing Robert Boyd — former assistant branch manager at a bank in Pittsburgh — who decided to leave that job to pursue trucking.
Here’s the kicker: He’s getting paid twice as much churning freight as he was pushing a pencil.
Here’s another kicker: According to the Bloomberg article, truck driver pay is increasing at a rate twice that of the rest of the U.S. workforce’s.
Whether you subscribe to the driver shortage theory or not, carriers are saying they can’t find enough qualified drivers, and they say that trend will continue for years, which only bodes well for driver pay.
Robert Boyd’s doubled salary may be — and more than likely is — an extreme outlier. But unlike many other fields, wage stagnation may not be something that touches truck drivers in the recovery period from the ’08 and ’09 recession.
I understand there are unattractive qualities right now in the form of pressing regulatory changes, skyrocketing fuel prices, demanding schedules that keep drivers away from home, etc.
There are, however, many attractive qualities, too, that shouldn’t overlooked, and stability and upward trending pay are two that could outweigh the unattractive qualities.
Is driving a truck the most attractive job in the country right now?
For those like Robert Boyd, who seek strong pay and job security (let alone all of the traditional attractions of trucking, like the independence and joy of the highway and the fulfillment that comes from providing a service necessary to keep the U.S. running), trucking may just be more attractive than anything else, in spite of its blemishes.