Gasoline prices have come down, so you might think that truckers are doing better than they were. However, the price of diesel is still hurting many of them.

Even though a gallon of diesel has gone down by almost a dollar in the last month, it’s still priced too high to pull the industry out of its slump. This is largely due to the fact that truckers just aren’t moving as many goods as they used to.

A slumping economy and lowered demand for a lot of items by consumers are keeping truckers parked or forcing them to return from deliveries with empty trucks instead of picking up another load for their return trip. When trucks run empty that costs the trucking companies a lot because those trucks still need to be fueled. There is still enough demand for diesel, though, that the price is higher than it needs to be.

A lot of truckers also racked up a lot of debt over the summer when prices were at their highest, and they need the prices to come down even more before they can begin to be profitable again.