The U.S. trucking industry has been shaken to its foundations. A welter of external challenges catalyzed the failure of approximately 88,000 trucking firms in 2023. That is 10% of the nation’s trucking companies.
The chief culprit was a steep rise in operational costs, led by increased driver salaries and lawsuits, resulting in a sharp uptick in truck insurance costs. These challenges powered a vicious cycle of squeezed margins and inflation in the cost of goods transported by trucks. If the rise in operational costs is not brought under control, all Americans will bear the brunt of the trucking industry’s woes in the form of higher prices for all manner of goods transported by truck.
