The six-figure club.

My wife is a PhD child psychologist. Her colleagues, staff, and clients all call her "Dr. M_____." She just got a big bump in pay this year which finally put her over $100k. However, this is my second year in "the club" and I made over 10 grand more than she did this year. I joke around with her that she's finally making Dayton Freight linehaul money! Fortunately for me, she can take a joke and she's proud--not jealous--of what I make as a truck driver.

She makes more money per hour than I do, but I work a lot more hours. And my job is way more dangerous than hers. It's also more dangerous than the average police officer's job, believe it or not. In fact, it's one of the most dangerous jobs in the United States. We mustn't lose sight of the risks involved and our work should never be devalued. This isn't "easy money" as some people would like to think. It's hard on our bodies and our brains and it shortens our life expectancy. That's a fact. That's what we're compensated for. That's what the market demands for our specific line of work, skills, and credentials. There is a short supply of us and we are in high demand. It's called capitalism.

As for anyone who doubts what we make (lookin' at you, @Happily Retired ) or thinks that we are lying or exaggerating (or faking screenshots), all I can say is that I work with @mickeyrat and we can vouch for each other. He can also vouch for the fact that I snagged me a PhD!

 

^^^^^^ LIES. ALL LIES.

 

A word about taxes: No matter what your politics are or how you feel about the necessity of funding government, none of us likes giving away our money. The only way we can shield our earnings from federal and state income taxes is to pay ourselves first by contributing as much as possible to our 401(k)s, HSAs, etc.

David Bach is a personal finance writer who has written many books about building wealth the slow and steady way. His main rules distilled from all of his books are that you should:
1) Pay yourself first, and
2) Make it automatic

That's exactly what the 401k does, and I don't even miss what I never see in my check in the first place. The federal government and my state can have their crack of at my money after I pay myself first.

My goal for 2022 and beyond is to shrink the yellow portion of my pie shown above and increase the green slice. My future self will no doubt thank me for it.

 

Yeah but if you contribute to an IRA, all that profit that you potentially could make is nontaxable when you need it and take it out over the age of 65. Or I think it’s actually 62. Not a bad deal. Especially if the markets double over the next 10 years which a lot of analysts are saying they will. Especially the NASDAQ. All that money is tax free.

 

I was on the fence about posting this. But since we are all getting friendly and open about what people could expect to take home each year, I would like to add on to the conversation about another key item to total compensation.

This is a real medical bill for my wife after giving birth to our second child. I don't want to get too much into her medical issues but there were complications. I left the deductibles that we paid last year for full disclosure on what we shelled out of pocket.

It's worth noting that our hourly pay is 20%+ less than almost any other LTL company in the area. We top put at $24/hour while others pay anywhere from $27-$35/hour.

But on the flip side of the coin our company pays our health insurance 100%. The plan we get is BCBS Silver. We did the math and it is worth $14/hour if you work a 40 hour work week. Of course that price gets diluted down over a 50+ workweek easily.

My whole point is that other carriers pay more, but they might have a less generous medical plan. One driver I talked to said he pays out $160 a week for his. But he says he makes more so it could be a wash.

My final thoughts are this. A unexpected medical emergency is the #1 cause of bankruptcy in the country. The life vest you bring home each week might be worth more than the meat and potatoes of your paycheck.

I want to thank everyone for being so transparent. I am not too terribly surprised because the salary ranges are roughly what I expected.

The real beneficiary of this thread will be someone that isn't in this field and will realize not how much he "should" be making, but "could" be making. We are an industry within an industry.

 

Okay so you said a couple of things there.

The good news is that you can do both. You are referring to a Roth IRA, where post tax money goes into it but all of the growth is tax-free when you take it out, which can be anytime after age 59 and 1/2. I do have a Roth IRA, but I don't contribute as much as I would like to yet.

The part about doubling in 10 years is actually very conceivable. There's a fact about compound interest known as the rule of 72, where if you take 72 and divide it by the annualized return of your investments, the number you get is the number of years it takes for the account to double. So a 7.2% annualized return will double your account in 10 years. Given that the market has averaged over 10% returns on average over the last 100 years that shouldn't be a problem using low-cost broad market index funds.

The best possible scenario is to max out both a 401k and a Roth IRA. That's my goal as soon as I can swing it (after some debts are paid off like my wife's student loan). The max you can put into a 401(k) in 2022 is $20,500 and the maximum contribution for a Roth IRA is $6,000.

The way I see it I should be able to live off of $85,000 a year comfortably while at the same time shielding as much of my income as possible from taxes, both in my working years through my 401(k) as well as in retirement through my Roth IRA.

 

Got my year end check. Missed a week on a medical leave and didn't volunteer a single day.
I run regional, home nightly with a fortune 200 cryo company. Probably could do 10K more.

 

his one liners are gold, trying to catch a show this year

 

The taxes you paid are nauseating. I really wish they'd cut us a break for the last two years given how essential and important we supposedly are. We are also in the sector that pretty much had to keep chugging along despite the uncertainty of the pandemic and an existing driver shortage.

They really should give us "essentials" a reduced tax bracket for a few years if people really are this thankful for our critical service.

 

just bring back the tax credit as it was before 2017