Stat of the Week: Where Are All the Women in Transportation?
For transportation companies experiencing driver shortages and high rates of employee turnover, an “all-comers” attitude only makes sense… right? Not quite. You could be missing opportunities to speak to the needs of an underused and undervalued working population. Instead of attempting to engage any and all qualified truckers, your company stands to grow by explicitly recruiting women.
According to Trucks.com, women comprise 47% of the U.S. labor force, and yet only 6% of truck drivers are women. As it happens, that percentage point hasn’t really changed since 2010. Take a look at the number of women working in transportation and material moving occupations:
Please share if you know someone who would benefit from seeing these stats.
There are multiple possible reasons for the lack of significant growth in opportunities for female truckers. For one, women tend to be shorter and weigh less than men. Then there are long-held misconceptions about gender—that trucking is a “man’s job,” or that women are unsafe drivers (as it turns out, women behind the wheel have half as many accidents as men).
But looking at the recruitment opportunity presented in these numbers, we can’t help but wonder: How much faster would a trucking company grow if it emphasized female recruitment? Could women solve some of the industry’s intractable problems?
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