A data brief · U.S. Census Bureau microdata, 2020–2024
The Trucker
Retirement Cliff
America runs on truckers, and a growing share of them are close to the end of the road. We analyzed Census records for every state to see how old each trucking workforce really is, and how thin the pipeline behind it runs.
U.S. truckers aged 55 or older
That is % of the country's million employed truckers, now within ten years of the traditional retirement age of 65.
of
states have more truckers over 55 than under 35
yrs
median age of a U.S. trucker, vs for all workers
of
states where over a third of truckers are already 55+
Where the cliff is steepest
Each square is a state, shaded by the share of its truckers who are 55 or older. The five oldest trucking workforces are outlined in amber. Hover or tap a state for its numbers.
Every state, ranked
Ranked by the share of each state's truckers who are 55 or older. The ratio column shows how many drivers aged 55+ each state has for every one under 35; anything above 1.00 means more drivers near retirement than in the pipeline.
| # | State | Truckers 55+ | Median age | 55+ per under-35 |
|---|
Estimates from Census survey records. Smaller states have wider uncertainty, so a gap of a point or two between neighboring ranks is within the survey's noise; the broad pattern is what is solid. The District of Columbia has very few trucker records and its figures are indicative only.
What the numbers say
The pipeline problem is nearly national. In of states, truckers over 55 now outnumber truckers under 35. Nationally there are drivers aged 55+ for every one under 35.
New England and the Midwest lead the cliff. has the oldest trucking workforce in the country, with % of its drivers aged 55 or older, followed by , , , and . In states, more than a third of the trucking workforce is already 55+.
The "average trucker is 57" line doesn't hold up, but the trend it points at is real. Industry surveys are often quoted saying the average driver is in their late fifties. Two independent federal surveys put the median much lower: our Census-microdata figure is , and the Bureau of Labor Statistics' own household survey says . Truckers are still years older than the typical American worker, and the 55+ share keeps the retirement question live either way.
Three of the five youngest trucking workforces are in the West. , , , , and have the smallest shares of drivers near retirement, a sign of where the next generation of drivers is showing up. Connecticut is the exception in New England, home to the country's two oldest trucking workforces.
Use this data
Journalists and bloggers: the figures are free to cite with credit. Copy the snippet to embed the top-10 table on your site, or grab the raw files in the sources section below.
How we did this
We used the Census Bureau's American Community Survey public microdata for 2020 through 2024, the largest ongoing survey of American households. From the 51 state files we pulled every record for people whose job is in the Census occupation group "driver/sales workers and truck drivers," records in all, and used the Census Bureau's own person weights to turn them into state-level estimates of the trucking workforce's age.
To check ourselves, we compared the results against two independent federal sources. The Bureau of Labor Statistics' household survey puts the national median trucker age at versus our , and its employer survey counts a national trucking workforce within about ten percent of ours.
Things worth knowing before you cite this:
- The occupation group includes delivery and route drivers as well as heavy tractor-trailer drivers. It is the same grouping the Bureau of Labor Statistics uses in its own age tables.
- Figures are an average of the 2020 to 2024 survey years, not a single-year snapshot. They cover the 50 states plus the District of Columbia, 51 geographies in all, and we use "states" loosely to include DC.
- These are survey estimates. Small states have wider uncertainty, and the District of Columbia's sample is very small.
- We count people who were employed when surveyed. Including unemployed drivers changes the shares slightly but not the story: the same state leads either way.
See for yourself
Every number on this page comes from public government files you can download yourself. Here is exactly what we used, with a fingerprint for each file so you can confirm you are looking at the same data we did.
The claim most worth checking is who counts as a "trucker." Our numbers use the Census occupation group that combines driver/sales workers with heavy and light truck drivers, because it is the same group the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports ages for. If you narrowed it to tractor-trailer drivers only, the level of every number would shift; that cut is not published here. The extract file above contains every record we used, so this is directly checkable.
Government agencies revise past figures from time to time. If a file you download today has a different fingerprint than the one listed, you have a newer file than this analysis was built on.
A data brief from Truck Driver Institute, a family-owned CDL school that has trained truck drivers since 1973, with campuses in Alabama, Florida, Indiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee. Figures are free to cite with credit and a link.