Tesla's (NASDAQ: TSLA) newest product, the Semi, is a fully electric semi truck capable of basic self-driving via Enhanced Autopilot, the "second generation of Tesla's semiautonomous technology." According to Elon Musk, the Semi will bring a "massive increase in safety" to American roads, citing the 4,000 Americans who die annually in collisions involving a truck, many of which are caused by human error. Big companies like Walmart (NYSE: WMT) and JB Hunt (NASDAQ: JBHT) have already placed preorders, and both view it as industry-changing technology that will help companies cut down on fuel and labor costs alike. Other companies who have invested billions of dollars in driverless vehicles include Alphabet (NASDAQ: GOOGL), Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL), Daimler (ETR: DAI), Uber, Ford (NYSE: F) and Toyota (NYSE: TM).
Yet the true cost of Musk's new technology will extend beyond the cost of the trucks themselves. Should the Semi thrive, it will cut into legions of truck driving jobs, by rendering them obsolete. Currently, nearly 3.2 million are employed as delivery and heavy truck drivers. But experts still lack an estimate of the effect automation will have on those whose families and livelihoods depend on truck-driving jobs.
The annual median wage for truck drivers nationwide is $34,768, which is 11% higher than the country's median wage. The profession also provides valuable entry points for blue collar work for minority men, including blacks, Hispanics, and Native Americans, who have faced serious racial barriers to entry in other blue collar jobs.
But truck driving has major drawbacks, including the physically inert nature of the work and the psychological exhaustion that comes with working the long shifts in isolation. These negative factors cause drivers to burn out after a few years, at a rate of 90% annual turnover for large truckload carriers, to the point where "there aren't enough truck drivers to go around".
Trucks today carry 70% of all goods that are domestically shipped, and bring in approximately $719 billion in annual revenue. Due to the burgeoning economy and growing population, experts expect the trucking industry to grow by 3.4% annually until 2023. In this respect, automated trucking could help bridge the gap between a lack of truckers, uncomfortable working conditions, and the needs of a growing industry. But given the many different ways automated trucking could progress as an industry, the future of the trucking industry post-automation is still unknown. Developments could render it possible for one driver to remotely control up to 30 trucks per shift, allowing the drivers themselves to go home at the end of the day, thereby increasing the desirability of the job. On the flip side, this could result in losses of up to 300,000 jobs annually, once these developments arrive and spread throughout the U.S.
The effects of automation may have greater negative effects on certain states, including North Dakota, Iowa, Wyoming, West Virginia, Mississippi, Arkansas, and Indiana, and unions are worried that less physically and mentally taxing jobs for their workers could someday correlate to lower wages overall.