New owner op too be. Need honest assessment

Excluding a driver pay is just a convention for more accurate cost analysis . For example, I am more interested in what the very operational costs are; excluding all other costs that are very arbitrary such as my own pay or maintenance fund or retirement fund, some my even include as cost their own health insurance premiums. I pay myself every month a "reasonable salary" and the rest is dividend - taxed differently and much less than the salary, and it is withdrawn as needed. In truth, the real owner operator's pay, such as mine, is different from a year to year/ or month to month, depending on how much of the dividend I withdraw, which is based on my needs and whims. More often than not, the "reasonable salary" of owner operators seems to be more of a payroll tax discount tool than an equivalent of top paying truck driving jobs seen on W-2s, especially, if there are other income sources at home. Is it reasonable to pay yourself a beginning Swift driver pay, anyway?
Sometimes for the sake of comparing apples to apples, it is more informative to compare only operational costs. For example, how much more does it cost to run one truck with a reefer vs one truck with a dry van? Or what are the costs of running a 30 year old truck with a 10 year old beat up box vs brand new Volvo 860 with a brand new Great Dane trailer with skirts and fairings?

 

@TallJoe, while I agree with you that when looking at costs it can be useful to isolate them, I don't agree that is wise when someone is looking at the whole business and deciding to jump in or not.

I think labor, especially, is grossly underestimated by first time business people. The associated taxes (Self employment tax / FICA), retirement contributions, workman's comp, health insurance, vacation pay, sick pay..... the list of "stuff related to labor" seems almost endless. To exclude it is unwise.

 

Thanks.