OTTAWA — For the first time, truckers 55 years-old and over outnumbered those under 30 last year, confirming that the gap in the so-called driver shortage is going to get a whole lot wider in the next few years, says a new Statistics Canada study.

The study, titled “On the Road Again: A Profile of Truckers, also found that 18 percent of the truck driver population is older than 55 and nearing retirement — 5 percent higher than the national average for other workers in general.

In 2004, the average age for wage-earning truckers was 42, while self-employed owner-operator counterparts were 45 years old. Just over 60 percent of the 271,000 listed truckers (the vast majority male) worked directly for a company whose principal activity was transporting freight, the study found.

The average truck driver is 42; owner-ops are 45

Not surprisingly, truckers appear more likely to remain longer in the labour force compared to other workers. For example, trucking was the sixth most popular occupation among employed men aged 65 and over in 2001.

Only 5 percent were under 25 in 2004, compared with 15 percent in the labour force as a whole. The minimum age for obtaining a commercial vehicle licence ranges between 18 and 20 depending on the province, while in most American states, the age is 21. However, as most carriers know, the shortage in that age group is compounded by the fact insurance is extremely difficult to get for drivers under 25, especially for international transport.

More alarming, however, may be that fact that only 25 percent of truckers were between 15 and 35, as opposed to 37 percent in the entire labour force.

“From the standpoint of supply, this indicates that today’s young workers are less inclined than the previous generation to enter the occupation,” the study states.

Overall, truckers are less educated than the average, and their ranks contain a smaller percentage of immigrants than overall workers, the study points out. Truckers earn a wage close to the average for all occupations, but they receive fewer benefits, especially with respect to a retirement plan.

By the same token, truckers work many more hours than the average for all occupations, often according to irregular schedules.