You know if I was offered a $17/hour job right now that had nothing to do with IT; I would not be on the road. Honestly I turned down a $65/hour contracting job because it had to do with IT; I just don’t want to do that work at that level anymore.
As much as many say you will do fine and comparable. My opinion is stay right where you are at. It is far easier on you and your family than going through the headache of setting this all up and being gone for two weeks at a time.
Many say it is easy to make the same amount of money, sure the actual work of picking up and dropping off and driving (I am talking about vans guys, not trucks) is easy but the business part sometimes is not. If you are not prepared for the work behind the scenes, stay where you are.
Why? Well let’s look at it somewhat how Leo laid it out.
First I have to assume a couple things, one is that you are strictly hourly and second that after 40 hours you get time and half (based on Overtime laws).
Gross base pay – $17 X 2080 = $35,360
Gross OT pay – $17 X 1.5 X 5 X 50 = $6,375
Gross total as you described = $41,735
I don’t have my tax tables in front of me, but I estimate (not a tax accountant this is only an estimate) your take home would be around $34,000 after everything is taken out.
With expediting the law of thirds is a good start, a third to taxes, a third to the van and a third to you. To take home $34,000 you have to multiply it by 3 or make $102,000. Now with FedEx that is a different story because you get paid by the load so I will exclude them. Others pay you by the mile, so let’s use Panther who advertises at 77¢/mile.
$102,000 / .77 = 132468 miles you have to drive in one year to make the same money.
Now with that said, presently you don’t pay quarterly payroll or income taxes, you are covered with unemployment (many places make you pay but you still have it) and you have worker comp paid, and you pay 6.5% SS and 3% Medicaid taxes instead of 12%/3% respectfully. Yea I know that the 12% is actually part of you wage but many employers make it look like they paid. Oh you also may have company subsidized health insurance.
So with expediting, you are the boss. You are responsible for everything, bar none. You will probably pay quarterly taxes and do so at the top bracket so Uncle Sam gets his money first, you will pay 12%/3% SS taxes and you have the headache of accounting and more chances for an audit. More or less depending on your accountant, you will have to incorporate or minimally register with the state as a DBA company and pay for that. Unless you are a tax accountant, you will have to get an accountant to do the work, not a tax preparer. H& R block, forget about it. Don’t forget food, clothing, a hotel room every once in a while, and the list goes on.
If you were making around $12/hour, I would say consider it, if you made under $10/hour I would say get a van and go for it, but not at $17/hour. I wonder if some of the ‘experts’ have ever figured out at what level of wage does expediting replace your income with real world figure? Seeing many view their income as too personal to publish, we may never know.
I figured my ‘effective’ hourly rate being on the road, this is being on call 24/7 while parked waiting for a load, is around $3/hour during the good times but more like <$1/hour during the bad times. Now this does not sound like much, no one can put an hourly figure on a salaried job and this is what is really is. To get an idea how to look at things, you have to look at your gross monthly to really see where you are and how you are doing.
I don’t mean to discourage you; I am being honest about this.
I would read everything on this site, including the heated discussions that take place. Go out and actually talk to some expediters at truck stops then decide.
As Danny said, “There are definitely good things abou expediting.â€, I totally agree.
