Thoughts on 1099 jobs vs W2?

Its NOT equal after taxes... most advertise something like .60 W2 / .70 1099. That's only a 16% increase in pay. Self-Employment tax alone eats 15.3% of it, leaving you 0.7% to cover things like UEI, Workman's Comp, Employer contributions to benefit plans, etc. Not to mention they *will* take "escrow" (it won't be legally held in escrow, it will just be gone).

W2 has no advantages over 1099, and is illegal the moment they force a single dispatch on you, tell you that you can't be home on the day you want, or tell you that you can't do something (anything) with their truck (like PC miles to go to the laundromat).

 

W2 employees pay the same social security tax
But in its most brilliant move ever , the fedgov forces the employer to sneakily yank the tax before you see it .


There’s a reason trucking companies do the 1099

it’s usually when your working for someone who only has two or three trucks and doesn’t want to spend the money paying an accounting and payroll service to do the payroll

either that or it’s a real sketchy Company from Chicago or owned by Russians .

 

1099s do have their rather valid pros for certain people. If you have insurance from another source, maybe it makes sense for you to take more money in your pocket and pay your own taxes.

But at the end of the day, that special case aside, it's a total ripoff by the company.

If you can't tell them when you'll be in and how long you're working for, you're a misclassified W2 employee.

Plus, not paying benefits or taxes, unless the company is paying an absolutely eye-popping rate, they're still not paying you the full compensation package a W2 employee would get.

It's about bringing in cheap labor that can be easily hung out to dry in court if something should go wrong. It protects the company, and does very little for the...ahem..."outside contractor" aside from put a couple extra bucks in his pocket every week in exchange for everything else.

 

Lots of shady Eastern European outfits operating in Chicagoland I would avoid. They’ll try to get you to do illegal stuff and have you driving junk equipment that will put you and your license at risk.

 

Sometimes it’s both!

 

After reading your OP, I figured you'd be fine going 1099, as you "knew what to expect". However that changes based on this:

99.99999999999999% of posts here bashing a company are Chicago-based 1099. They force dispatch, and they steal escrow/last paycheck. There's tons of companies that will hire you into a real job, even with a sketchy record. @Chinatown

You absolutely can make 1099 work, as long as you and your "employer" realize YOU'RE the boss, and not them. Picture contract work. As long as you look at the tax aspect of it, you can do the math and see if it works. But Chicago-based outfits are doing it to skirt the law. You need to be real F'n careful. If you want real 1099 work, then get your own numbers.

 

Just do what works best for you, either situation is fine.

 

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