A Friday, August 1 report from FreightWaves offered some surprisingly positive news about employment in the trucking industry. Seasonally adjusted trucking jobs increased by 3,600 to 1,523,300 jobs according to the Bureau of Labor Standards.
This is the sort of thing we look for to indicate the freight recession is truly behind us and the trucking industry is regaining its solid footing. The only problem is the rest of the report doesn’t track with that analysis, which might mean whatever happened with truck jobs in July is an anomaly.
Consider a body blow suffered by employees of the warehouse sector, which lost 6,400 jobs in July – and that follows a downward revision of the June report that erased another 12,000 jobs. The warehouse sector now has fewer jobs than at any time since October 2021, which was just at the start of the COVID surge.
Now, you might think, that’s rough news for warehousing but it still looks good for trucking. But the same story quotes an analyst from Uber Freight as saying trucking operating costs are still exceeding both spot rates and contract rates, so carrier margins are still weak.
What to make of all this?
It’s not as if no one in the industry is doing well. Schneider last week reported revenue and earnings growth for the second quarter of 2025, with net income of $36 million and total revenue of $1.42 billion – which is up 8 percent from the same period in 2024.
“We delivered another quarter of earnings growth driven by solid execution, particularly in our truckload and intermodal segments,” CEO Mark Rourke said. “The second quarter saw consistent demand trends with some seasonal patterns emerging, though less pronounced than usual, despite ongoing economic uncertainty.”
At the same time, the intermodal and logistics company Hub Group reported its Q2 revenue down by 8.2 percent compared with last year, and put the blame squarely on tariffs:
“The second quarter was challenged versus typical seasonality due to the tariff-driven adjustments to shipping patterns,” Hub Group CEO Phil Yeager said during a call with investors. “Our more transactional service lines were impacted less than we anticipated, but we did experience a decline in demand due to slower import volumes near the end of the quarter. Offsetting those headwinds, our contractual services performed well and maintained resiliency.”
If trade is the cause of the turbulence, its impact at the ports is decidedly mixed, with the Port of Los Angeles showing an 8 percent increase in container volumes in June, while the Port of Long Beach saw a 16.4 percent decrease in volume and the Port of Oakland experienced a 12.8 percent drop.
Other port volume decreases included:
So does the full picture give us no reason to celebrate the jump in trucking employment? Not necessarily, according to Commtrex CEO Martin Lew.
“The fact that carriers are adding to their workforces shows that they see encouraging signs over the near term,” Lew said. “The fact that rates haven’t yet caught up explains why many are failing to cover their operating costs even as they add people, and that could very well be a short-term impact of tariffs. But the companies that are adding people are most likely seeing improved fundamentals that hopefully will transcend the short-term impact of tariffs.”
As for the decline in warehouse employment, Lew said a combination of long-term and short-term factors is likely responsible.
“The ramp-up of the industry during COVID expanded warehouse sector employment tremendously,” Lew said. “Some of that was bound to correct, but the impact of tariffs on overall trade activity has combined with this correction to give us these stunningly low numbers. The warehouse industry is too vital not to bounce back, although it’s critical to say that those who are modernizing their operations and providing the greatest visibility will be in the best position to emerge from this period in strong condition.”