I want to be a trucker!!!

Since we're on the subject of being a doctor, I would like to chime in since I work in a hospital.
University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center. Specifically, I'm one of the IT techs in the School of Medicine - Radiology department. I'm not posting this to brag, but I am posting to let you know that I have first hand information from being around and talking to people at varying points in their medical career. Several residents already have $600k+ in student loan debt and they still have several more years left before being "done" with school. Unlike other types of loans, you can't declare bankruptcy and get rid of a student loan balance....you WILL repay it no matter what,

On the subject of how to pay for it......there are a multitude of grants, loans, and scholarships that are available to help pay for higher education. Take me, for example, I'm majoring in Information Technology & Management Information Systems (IT / MIS). For the current semester that runs January - May, I applied through the FAFSA program (https://fafsa.ed.gov/) and I qualified for a federal Pell grant of $3800. Pell grants, unlike "traditional" Stafford loans, do not have to be paid back. I'm taking 15 credit hours which is considered "full time" and my tuition at the University of New Mexico (UNM) was just a touch over $1000. The rest of the grant was given directly to me, so I got a $2800 direct deposit into my bank account about a week before the semester began.

With that money, I was able to spend another $500+ on just books. Seriously, most of my books were between $100 - $225. My Computer Science 150 course was the most expensive single book at $225....that was a used copy mind you. I ended up purchasing more supplies like notebooks, pencils, pens, graphing calculator, etc. By the time it was all done and over with, I had about $1400 left to play around with.

Anyway, as others have said, I would stay far away from trucking. I did it for almost 10 years and it tore my body up (I hauled heavy equipment / flatbed), almost ruined my marriage several times, I missed a lot of milestones when my two kids were infants / toddlers, and I just generally hated the lifestyle. It's not just a job - it is quite literally a lifestyle. So here I am, a 35 year old college student.

 

After many years of hard work, branching out into specialized freight and doing extremely well and not being one of the many to go bankrupt in your first 6-12 months.

In the current freight market, it's not really recommended for anyone to go into business for themselves. It's much better to just be a company driver and let someone else handle the "hard" work.

 

There's nothing wrong with driving a truck. Just be happy. You've got plenty of time to figure it all out.

 

In whatever a man decides to do, one must crawl before he walks. You said you're 16? Just get your education now. You've got too many life experiences ahead of you the next 6-7 yrs to be trying to figure out what you'll be doing when you're 40. Don't force a decision now. There are many things that will seem appealing over the next several years. And above all else pray about it too.