Broker transparency is a decoy.

For over a decade, some of the loudest voices in trucking advocacy have pushed a singular message to lawmakers: BROKER TRANSPARENCY!!! Has it worked? No.

Jul 23, 2025

Trucking Needs a New Advocacy Playbook

For over a decade, some of the loudest voices in trucking advocacy have pushed a singular message to lawmakers: BROKER TRANSPARENCY!!!

Has it worked? No.

However, it has distracted from the structural rot that is eating away at the industry.

While advocates focused on rates and broker margins, fraudulent carriers, fake CDLs, shell companies, and regulatory loopholes quietly reshaped the market. FMCSA oversight eroded. Compliance became optional. And the cost of doing business legally became unsustainable.

Yet somehow, the advocacy playbook remains unchanged. Still broker transparency. Still the same demands. Still the same cries. Still ignoring the forces actually driving rates into the ground.

If the goal is to protect the American trucker, this strategy has failed.
Lawmakers have heard it all before. And they’ve stopped listening.

It’s time for a new approach.

Broker Transparency will not fix it.

The logic is that brokers should be forced to disclose every penny of every transaction, and the industry would suddenly become fairer, more profitable, and more efficient.

But as my dad always says, “Life’s not fair.”
Broker transparency is not the silver bullet people think it is.

Are there bad brokers? Sure.
Are there bad carriers? Absolutely.
Are there good brokers? Yes.
Are there good carriers? Oh my goodness, YES.

You cannot assume every freight broker makes a 44% margin based on ONE transaction.

According to the Transportation Intermediaries Association (TIA), the average broker margin is just 15–18%. When brokers are involved in a freight transaction, they, of course, make money. It’s a business, not charity.

The carrier needs to profit. The broker needs to profit. And yes, the shipper does too.

Everyone in the supply chain is trying to stay afloat.
This isn’t complicated. It’s commerce.

Even if 100% broker transparency were mandated tomorrow, rates wouldn’t magically spike. I honestly think this would drive rates even lower, but that’s just my theory.

Shippers would see what carriers are willing to haul for and push rates down further. Transparency doesn’t guarantee fairness. In a flooded market, it simply provides everyone with a clearer view of the race to the bottom. The more one knows about the rates, the more opportunity they have to undercut the rate just a little bit until we are truly at the bottom.

If your business model relies on clawing back a few dollars from a broker, you’re not in the wrong industry. You are playing the wrong game.

Fraudulent Carriers and Market Flooding

Between 2018 and 2025, over 600,000 new USDOT numbers were registered. This is double the growth rate of the previous decade. Many of these are associated with short-lived, poorly vetted carriers that evade compliance and disappear when the FMCSA comes knocking.

In today’s freight market, you’re not just competing against other drivers. You’re competing against:

Ghost carriers operating under recycled or fraudulent DOT numbers
Shell companies spun up to move a few cheap loads and vanish
Non-domiciled immigrant drivers running on illegally obtained CDLs
Fake insurance policies, fraudulent filings, and forged lease agreements
Dispatchers or shell carriers bidding with stolen or borrowed credentials
ELD manipulation that allows drivers to falsify logs and violate HOS

They can charge $0.79 per mile because they don’t bear the cost of legal compliance.
It’s the freight equivalent of counterfeit money. And it’s flooding the economy.

These fraudulent operators:

Distort the market
Undercut honest rates
Make legal carriers uncompetitive
Undermine trust between shippers, brokers, and carriers
And most critically, endanger public safety

Transparency won't fix this. It never will.
This isn’t a pricing problem. It’s a criminal one.
And pretending otherwise just lets the real offenders off the hook.

Stop playing the blame game.

No one is forcing carriers to take brokered loads.
If the rate doesn’t make sense, don’t haul it.

Low rates persist because enough carriers continue to accept them.

Build direct shipper relationships.
Work with brokers who genuinely value partnerships.
Use a technology platform that facilitates relationships between shippers and carriers.

Transparency sounds nice in theory. But it won’t fix an industry gutted by fraud, oversupply, enforcement failure, and government inaction.