Every morning, thousands of families in North Carolina depend on something seemingly simple: for the school bus to arrive on time. For many parents, it is not a convenience. It is the difference between being able to get to work or having to rearrange their entire day because their children have no way to get to school.
Consider one case. At the start of the new school year, Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools acknowledged that 42 of its 237 buses with assigned routes did not have drivers, representing nearly 18%. The district warned families to prepare for delays.
What Is Causing the “Driver Shortage”?
For years, people have talked about the “driver shortage” as if the people capable of driving a bus had suddenly disappeared. Perhaps we should ask the question differently: are we offering wages high enough for someone to want to take on this job?
Driving a school bus involves much more than operating a vehicle. It means obtaining and maintaining the required licenses, driving a large vehicle, complying with strict safety regulations and, above all, assuming daily responsibility for transporting dozens of children.
North Carolina maintains a particularly modest wage structure. The state salary schedule sets a floor equivalent to $15 per hour for bus drivers. Data from NC Careers puts the median annual salary for school bus drivers in the state at approximately $37,000.
The national comparison is revealing. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median annual salary for a school bus driver in the United States reached $49,000 in 2025.
That means a difference of more than $10,000 annually compared with the median level reported for North Carolina.
There is an additional challenge. Overall wages in the region tend to be lower than in other metropolitan areas, meaning school districts compete against factories, distribution centers, transportation companies, warehouses, and other employers.
And that is where the contradiction emerges.
A person capable of obtaining a commercial driver’s license, passing safety checks and responsibly transporting students can also find opportunities in other sectors. If those alternatives pay more, offer continuous shifts and potentially more hours, it is difficult to be surprised that schools are struggling to hire.
The schedule also matters. Many school bus routes split the workday between morning and afternoon hours. For some workers, that means having their entire day committed without receiving the income associated with a full-time workday.
The Problem Falls on Families
The lack of drivers affects attendance, punctuality, learning, and families’ job stability.
A late bus can mean that a student misses part of the first class. A route without a driver can force districts to combine routes and lengthen travel times. And for parents who work hourly jobs and do not have workplace flexibility, personally taking their children to school can mean losing wages.
Even more concerning is that there does not appear to be an immediate solution. Hiring takes time. Obtaining licenses and completing training also take time. And if the economic conditions of the job remain uncompetitive, recruitment campaigns will have limited results.
North Carolina can continue putting up signs saying, “We’re Hiring.” Winston-Salem can organize job fairs and speed up hiring processes. All of that helps. But no recruitment strategy can ignore a basic economic reality: when dozens of positions remain vacant for long periods, we must also ask whether the wages being offered correspond to the value and responsibility of the job.
Perhaps the problem is not that North Carolina cannot find enough drivers. Perhaps it is that it is still unwilling to pay what it takes to find them.
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