Economics & Safety

Trucking Drives the Economy

Discover the significant role trucking plays in fueling West Virginia's economic vitality through key employment, wage, and transportation statistics.

Trucks transport the "tangible" goods portion of the economy, which is nearly everything consumed by households and businesses. In West Virginia, nearly everything we use is transported by truck, including building materials, machines, food, logs and lumber, mining equipment, and other industrial products.

Nearly every good consumed in West Virginia is put on a truck at some point. As a result, the West Virginia trucking industry hauls nearly 70% of all freight transported. Nationally, the trucking industry is an astounding $610 billion industry (in 2003), representing 86.9% of the nation's freight bill.

Essential Economic Facts:

Employment

34,410 jobs in the trucking industry in West Virginia, or one out of 16 jobs in the state.

Wages

Trucking industry wages exceeded $1.3 billion, with an average annual trucking industry salary of $38,456. (Truck drivers held 16,160 of these jobs at an annual salary of $33,305.)

Transportation of Essential Products

Trucks transported 67 percent of total manufactured tonnage in the state or 162,521 tons per day. Over 84 percent of communities depend exclusively on trucks to move their goods.

Trucking Pays the Freight

Explore the substantial financial contributions of the trucking industry to West Virginia's infrastructure, detailing federal and state taxes paid by both the industry and individual carriers.

As an Industry

Recent reports show the trucking industry in WV paid approximately $246 million in federal and state roadway taxes and fees. The industry paid 37 percent of all taxes and fees owed by West Virginia motorists, despite trucks representing only 15 percent of vehicle miles traveled in the state.

Individual Companies

A typical five-axle tractor semi-trailer combination paid $8,357 in state highway user fees and taxes in addition to $8,906 in federal user fees and taxes. These taxes were over and above the typical taxes paid by businesses in West Virginia.

Safety Matters

Continually Improving

At the national level, the truck-involved fatal crash rate for 2011 was 1.25 fatal crashes per 100 million vehicle miles of travel (VMT). This rate is at its lowest point since the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) began keeping these records in 1975. Since that time it has dropped 73%.

Sharing the Road

The trucking industry is committed to sharing the road safely with all vehicles. The Share the Road program sends a team of professional truck drivers to communities around the country to teach car drivers about truck blind spots, stopping distances and safe merging around large trucks, all designed to reduce the number of car-truck accidents.

Safety First

The West Virginia Trucking Association puts safety first through improved driver training, investment in advanced safety technologies and active participation in safety initiatives at the local, state and national levels. Annually the Association holds a Truck Driving Championship and a Safety Banquet. These events promote safety and recognize professionals in our industry for their expertise.

The West Virginia Trucking Association has entered into a partnership with the WV Superintendents of Schools where by they have endorsed the showing of the Share the Road video to all high school students. We travel to give demonstrations to students each year.