Why Become an Owner Operator?

But we can't. And change does not always take the direction that you choose. Right now, the winds of change are blowing drivers in from Africa, Cuba, and Mexico. In the near future, it's likely that drivers will be largely eliminated altogether. A shutdown hurts no one but the drivers. They will bring people in from Mexico and Canada, to run freight in the US, if they have to, and accelerate the training track for tomorrow's steering wheel holders.

We don't have the power that we did in Hoffa's day.

 

I am on track to average over 1400 gross a week as a company driver. I have great health insurance. Get nine paid holidays a year. 6 percent match to my ira. All my breakfasts and dinners are paid for by the company when I stay out over night. I also work Monday through Friday 46 out of 52 weeks a year. I have been with my company for three and a half years. I also get two weeks paid vacation. I averaged 60 hours a week last year. Not slavery by a long shot. They also can't shoot you for running away.

 

Yawn.

 

We have a President who talks a good game about foreign labor, but if you look around the truck stops, it isn't going away - and you can bet that our billionaire business leader will certainly bring in union-busting scab labor, if domestic labor becomes recalcitrant in ways that lower his popularity. Have you noticed that he hasn't gotten involved in reducing DoT regulations, either?

Change, he is. Your friend, he's not. We're all desperate to break the patterns of corruption, laziness, and stupidity in Washington, but it's roots go far deeper than any specific political office, which means that seeking political office can't seriously accomplish anything except personal gain for the candidate. It matters very little which pig we put in front of the trough... unless it's me...

 

I did it against the advice of most I know in the business because I wanted to know now, wether or not I could succeed. Like a crazy person, with a negative net worth, 0 down, and on a brand new truck. I already know I will drive a truck in some capacity till I retire, it would be a shame to find out it works for me in the winding down years rather than in my prime.

So far (let me emphasize so far) it's worked. I cant speak on being indepedant, as I am leased to a carrier (a small, transparent one with a rare great percentage of gross, and pick and choose freight) but 4 years in...... I have a positive net worth, make more than I did as a company driver, can now afford a new pickup and new car for my wife, and a vacation every year or two. My truck has a bangin stereo, great headlights, and big power. What more does a driver REALLY want?

Yes it's definitely buying a job, but a job I know I will never have working for someone else. Gotta be realistic. It could all blow up in my face like it does for many, warranty just ran out with another year to pay for it. Off to a great start into that year, this month I just had unwanted 2 weeks off for a fan hub grenading and the worst supply chain ever. Then blown rad hose, then water pump, then power divider and inter axle driveshaft and some other junk, then whatever happens next week. But with the eye of the tiger, it always works out. That, and I didn't get a lemon thank God.

My boss is tough though - he makes me work allllllllll the time, like to the point that when im home my wife says I frequently sleep with my arms straight up in the air as if im driving... he also makes me grease the truck in the pouring rain, and give him a handy before bed each night on the road. So is it worth it? To most no, but to some, definitely.

 

It's good rhetoric, if it's just you, whose head you are putting on the chopping block. Most drivers are working to feed and house families, and the rhetoric sounds pretty hollow in the echo-chamber of your kids' empty stomachs.

You will not get half of us to shut down, not even for a day. We absolutely will die on our knees, if that's what it takes to keep our kids' needs supplied for another day. Recruit revolutionary suicide squads from people with nothing left to lose. They might be willing to risk it.