Table 4-3. Employment in For-Hire Transportation Primarily Serving Freight¹ (Thousands)

Employment in many transportation industries has remained steady or has grown over the past two decades, but it has plummeted in rail transportation as productivity has soared. Between 1980 and 2005, rail employment declined nearly 60 percent. Consequently, in 2005 rail transportation employed only 5 percent of those working in the transportation and warehousing industry compared with 18 percent in 1980. By comparison, employment in trucking in 2005 accounted for about one-third of employment in transportation and warehousing.

Table in Excel format | Historical data

	1980	1990	2000	2004	2005
Total U.S. labor force2	90,528	109,487	131,785	(R) 131,435	133,463
Transportation and warehousing	2,961	3,476	4,410	(R) 4,249	4,347
Rail transportation	518	272	232	(R) 226	228
Water transportation	NA	57	56	(R) 56	61
Truck transportation	NA	1,122	1,406	(R) 1,352	1,393
Pipeline transportation	NA	60	46	(R) 38	38
Support activities for transportation	NA	364	537	(R) 535	551
Couriers and messengers	NA	375	605	(R) 557	572
Warehousing and storage	NA	407	514	(R) 558	585

Key: NA = not available; R = revised.

¹Annual averages.
²Excludes farm employment.

Note: These data include workers employed in transportation industries but not necessarily in a transportation occupation, such as a lawyer working for a trucking company. Moreover, these data exclude workers in transportation occupations employed by non-transportation industries, such as a truck driver employed by a retail company.

Source: U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Current Employment Statistics survey, available at www.bls.gov as of May 3, 2006.