Profit margin. The driver just isn't an expensive or limiting part of cargo transport.
To be clear, the conversation also isn't about autonomous driving for individually-owned cars. Tesla's disasters aside, its about autonomous taxi services.
To be clear, the conversation also isn't about autonomous driving for individually-owned cars. Tesla's disasters aside, its about autonomous taxi services.
Both would be valuable - but a truck that is 30% more fuel efficient is probably going to save more money than one that doesn't need a driver (but still needs people more loading).
There are different estimates everywhere - but I usually see 20-30% of trucking costs are drivers. In other freight industries (cargo ships, trains, etc.) it would obviously be less.
https://www.thetruckersreport.com/infographics/cost-of-truck...
So this is all about scale. Everyone is obsessing over Uber for cultural and political reasons, but there are 1/10 as many taxi drivers as truck drivers, and they earn half as much. The big money is in trucking, and even if the problem is only half solved (say just for some long-haul routes), it would be worth hundreds of billions of dollars, even if truck driver wages are not the single most expensive cost. Hell they could be the 10th or 20th most expensive, what matters is the billions that could be saved, not the rank ordering.
{1}https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2019/article/is-the-us-labor-ma...