Is O/O A Good Idea Soon...

Weird, because I don’t own a glider or a pre-emission engine.

Not every owner operator feels the need to run paper. If that’s your opinion then fine, but people will still own trucks if they make older ECM equipped trucks run an ELD.

 

Zero financial risk to yourself? I’m sorry but an employee has the highest risk without any control of the business.

 

I find it odd….. when I bought my first truck in the 80’s, we needed only a chauffeur license to drive these rigs. Then came the glorious CDL’s.

Then here comes the I’m gonna save the world of trucking idea of electronic logs.

And so far, I haven’t had one single person prove to me that either one saves lives!

Pushing 36 years on paper….

 

The best protection from an accident is a safe driver….

 

The very worst case scenario for an employee is losing their job. The very worst case scenario for an Owner Operator is they lose everything and go bankrupt or lose a very large amount of their savings. Owner Operators carry all the risks. Employees can just find another job (and I highly doubt that Estes is going anywhere within our lifetime).

I'm not sure what you're getting at that being an employee brings more risks than owning your own business? Especially in trucking. With all due respect, that makes zero sense. Employees at any kind of job carry zero financial risks to themselves, they can just find another job if they have to without going bankrupt or losing a large amount of money.

 

As an employee your well being is in someone else’s hands. I don’t like that. If I’m going down it will be my own doing.

 

my suggestion is ride out the next 2 years and see where trucking is at then. Being an owner operator isn’t easy. You are literally every position in a Company, from janitor all the way up to CEO. Everything falls on you.

not everyone can be a company driver and definitely not everyone can be an owner operator.

trucks down? Could be 4-6 weeks. As an owner op, as a company driver at Estes? Most likely 24 hours new truck.

so literally think long and hard.

 

You have a very good grasp of what a job and benefits are actually worth and you have laid it out well in your post. In the OP’s case he has a very well paying job with excellent benefits. Myself and the handful of successful owner ops that I interact with routinely also had 6 figure company jobs with excellent benefits we walked away from for a variety of reasons. I don’t need the income I have, but I am accustomed to a good income and likely wouldn’t be happy today without it.
I don’t know the OP personally and would agree with you that if it is strictly about money he should stay put and make the extra money he wants. If he is wired like those of us who want to be more in control of our lives and also make good money, he could eventually figure out a way to do so. I work daily around numerous drivers who have or would like to become owner ops. Some made the move and it didn’t work out and some have been very successful. Those who have spoken with me about being an owner op, I have talked more of them out of becoming owner ops than I have talked in to doing so. Those who have made the move successfully wouldn’t go back to company jobs. Being an owner op definitely isn’t for everyone, but it is for me and many other people for a multitude of reasons.

 

If the engine blows on the Estes truck does he have to fork over the cash to get a new one installed ?
Is he losing revenue for 6-10 weeks while it gets repaired ?

and that health insurance he’s paying $100 a month for is going to cost $1200 a month or more .