Walmart Touts Trucker Pay Raise, $110K Salaries Amid Tight Labor Market

Walmart upped the pay for truck drivers amid a severe driver shortage and tight labor market, it announced last week. Walmart Private Fleet drivers can make up to $110,000 in their first year with the company, Fernando Cortes, senior vice president-transportation, blogged Thursday, saying that’s “just a start”: Drivers who have been with Walmart longer can earn “even more,” based on tenure and location. The company launched a 12-week Walmart Private Fleet Development Program for supply chain workers in the Dallas and Dover, Delaware, areas who could earn their commercial driver’s license and become Private Fleet drivers. Walmart tapped its 12,000-driver fleet for certified driver trainers, who taught written material and oversaw driving with “months” of real-world experience, Cortes said. Walmart’s investments in pay and training “build on multiple recent driver bonuses and improved schedules that enable drivers to spend more time at home,” he said. A February New York Times article said the U.S. last year had a deficit of 80,000 truck drivers and trucking fleets are offering $10,000 cash bonuses to “court new hires.” The American Trucking Associations took exception to a March guest essay in The New York Times giving a 91% turnover rate in 2019 -- citing wages as the top factor -- saying the essay suggested truckers were leaving the industry. The trade group affirmed the rate in a blog post but said it “captures churn within the industry -- not attrition from the industry.” It claimed demand and opportunity are leading drivers to move among carriers with “unprecedented pay increases” across the industry. COVID-19 exacerbated an “extremely tight labor market,” ATA said, and now weekly driver earnings are at five times their historical average.