Page 24: of Marine News Magazine (January 2025)

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Feature

Training & Education

AT LAST COUNT:

A Changing U.S. Mariner Demographic?

By Joseph Keefe t has been quite a while (2019) since we last looked The total number of graduates from the nation’s mari- at the U.S. mariner population, its make-up and tried time academies peaked in 2018, right around the same time to make some sense of it all. Actually, it has been a license-track students also reached their apex. For the latter

LONG time since anyone did it, and MarineNews number, it has been all downhill ever since; with licensed

I arguably does a better job in analyzing and compiling the graduates dropping precipitously from a high of 1113 (2016) data than anyone else. The numbers provide interesting to 810 in 2024. That’s a 27 percent decline, in case you are fodder with which we can take a look at where mariners keeping score. Total enrollment at the academies, with no- come from. In this edition, and with updates from Marad table exceptions, is also down during the same timeframe. at my ? ngertips, we have a rich trove of data from which Nevertheless, and averaging 902 unlimited licenses per to make these, and other assumptions. year for a 17-year period dating back to 2008, fresh, shiny

Almost ten years ago, a surge in license-track students faced of? cers poured into the marine workplace. The per- at the nation’s six state maritime academies (SMA) had centage of each class that opts for the license track option matched Jones Act, blue water recapitalization efforts then is also down (57% in 2023 – down from a high of 68% in underway. Ships were being churned out, mariner demand 2017). The average percent of graduates opting for licenses was high, and salaries had spiked. Almost made me wish I over the 17-year spread is about 59%. The 2024 numbers was back at sea. Almost. But by 2017, the deep draft em- that Marad made available just before went to press, showed ployment situation had slowed, arguably at a very bad time. the percent of students opting for licenses up to 62%, but the

That’s because collective seven maritime schools were crank- actual number of licensed graduates dipped because of a total ing out approximately 1,100 licensed graduates annually. reduced graduating class. That’s rock-solid data, for the most

Today, the blue water commercial employment situa- part, except for what has been recorded out of the TAMMA tion continues to worsen, while at the same time, external school, where for whatever reason, it can be seen that the threats to national security have heightened considerably. data is all over the place, but the last six years of data (taken

Similarly, the U.S. Flag deep draft vessel count continues directly from Marad’s meticulous records) can be considered to wane. That’s because, in part, even with a fairly robust accurate. Even that likely unrepresentative 17-year cumula- ? eet replacement program underway, the ships tend to be tive number doesn’t move the collective needle very much.

bigger, carry more cargo and hence, the ? eet modernization Nevertheless, and over the course of the last 17 years, is anything but a one-for-one newbuild program. Table 1 more than 15,000 domestic unlimited license mariners gives a snapshot of the commercial deep draft U.S. ? ag ? eet. have been produced. That’s a lot of mariners for a couple of hundred merchant ships employing reduced manning

Table 1: Blue Water U.S. Flag Count (>1000 GT) protocols. But, throw in the Military Sealift Command,

Category20172022 which operates approximately 125 civilian-crewed ships

Total Ships 181178 that support the U.S. Navy’s specialized missions, and

Jones Act Eligible 9993 maybe there aren’t enough mariners to go around, after all.

Non-Jones Act Eligible 8285

Table 2 tells you all you ever wanted to know about do-

Source: Marad mestic maritime academy students, but were afraid to ask: 24 | MN January 2025