+100% Turnover-Is This One of the answers?

This article was in Forbes magazine this week.  Do you agree with the solution?

It’s remarkable how fully optimized some industries are – computer chips and potato chips come to mind, as in Intel and Pepsico’s Frito-Lay – and how others continue to offer enormous pieces of low-hanging fruit to the enterprising business leader.

By the American Trucking Associations’ count, annual driver turnover runs nearly 100% at so-called large truckload carriers, also known as long-haul truckers. And if it costs $3,000-to-$5,000 to recruit and hire one driver (I’m told that estimate is conservative), keeping the million or so long-haul driver jobs (1) filled every year represents a $3 billion-to-$5 billion toll on an industry that already suffers from narrow profit margins and an enormous need for capital.

The turnover is disastrous for drivers, too. Many are never at a single employer long enough to accumulate any retirement savings. They typically live paycheck-to-paycheck while employed, and then suffer a big step down in income when they retire with only social security.

Despite this being the business problem that has plagued – and, indeed, defined – the trucking industry for years, there has been little or no overall improvement. Drivers job hop. Trucking firms devote enormous resources to recruiting. And everyone’s the worse for it.

What could possibly fix this mess? Without a doubt, in many cases, an Employee Stock Ownership Plan, or ESOP.