Owner Operators, who’s in and who’s out? (poll)

taxes do work a bit different, you can have a better quality of life as a single truck O/o on less money than a regular company guy makes IF you know where to put it,
the average guy keeps the company driver mind set though and that doesn’t translate to the best business deals

would never buy a day cab though, bought my truck because we were working hourly about 15 minutes away from the yard for the state on a highway job, lots of show up and blow smoke, and it sucks doing that over a steering wheel …

 

Good for you, it looks you're living in an island and the storm didn't affect you. Honestly, I don't buy it.
Meanwhile, if a driver has started working for the company I work for right now at the age of 30 like 20 years ago, now that driver would be a multimillionaire...

 

What don’t you buy? Sounds petty legit to me? I know lots of “trucking” people that are millionaires. Most own there own businesses, not drive someone else’s truck. Yeah, if I worked for UPS the last 30 years I could be set right now…. And a hand full of other companies. But I’d be dead from a self inflicted GSW…

 

Still have one trailer left. Sold the power unit, other trailer and authority over the course of the previous year.

Took a year off before that and pulled a job wrenching on forklifts and heavy equipment to bide time and think about if I truly wanted to get out of the seat or not.

Now, I don't even want to drive at all. Not even locally so I took another job dispatching for a large multinational concrete conglomerate making good coin on way less hours.

I knew when things started to slow down that it was going to continue getting worse and frankly I don't think it'll ever recover to a state that would appease me since there are so many foreigners to compete with now that can run for far less than I can.

They can have it. I'm tired of being the mule. I'm riding it out until an early retirement at 62. I have zero debt and paid off house thanks the sale of the business so I SS will cover everything I need to retire.

Working on top of that is all spending money in my pocket when the time comes. I don't miss the trucking life one bit.

 

Surely you don’t think your company is the only place that has millionaires driving a rig. Mr Scotty may have more money saved than any one of us or any driver at your company. That is his business and besides the point anyway. There are people doing exactly the same thing as I do who fail, but somehow some of us thrive. Not everyone is capable of successfully running a business or thriving in trucking but it definitely can be done.

 

I just ran across a new YouTube channel with the same name as you.

 

If a person has their business and personal life debt free, they can earn substantially less and still have a solid lifestyle. Could Scotty make more as a company driver? Probably. Does he need to make more? Nope.

Plenty of guys in his position. Plenty more that didn't plan during the boom times and got caught out.

 

@Banker, I wish! I do have a decent nest egg from a 25 year stent with a big company but I'm no millionaire. They are out there though and I applaud them. I've learned enough in this business to buy and run trucks, and with a little luck maybe even do it successfully through the downturns, but I'm too old and too lazy to start that now.

Success in this game is in the eye of the beholder. Success is doing what you want to do and being happy with your decisions, not looking at what other others in this game are doing, or how they say they are doing. No one has to believe what I say. I don't answer to them.

This ^^^ describes my mindset really well. I'm on track to gross about half as much this year as last year but I'm not worried about it. Still putting food on the table.

I'll tell you what will run me out of this business. AI. I hate it. I'm not interested in negotiating with computers every day. Stuff like Highway is ruining it as well. The reason I left my last job is that they wanted a robot, not a human being.

 

What some folks like your critic Mr Learner fail to understand is that many of us have worked many years to get to a place where we can do what we want. I passed by two different mediocre loads yesterday to deadhead home to my pool. If I needed the money I would have stopped and picked one up. The decision was mine to make not anyone else. I still will eat today in spite of my choice yesterday. The load down paid me enough to not worry about a Backhaul.

 

I'm not his critic, I just don't believe there's a small trucking business out there that has not been affected negatively in the past 3 years.

Then you may refuse a load, but at the end of the day the market dictates your business revenue, not you.