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Driving semi trucks, I feel as though I've hit the upper end of the payscale as far as it all goes. There's been wild stories and accounts of company drivers in the foodservice and Less-than-truckload segments hitting these near-$100k/year figures. But when calling around to different jobs before applying to them, I'm usually being given more realistic, ballpark figures of $50k-$70k/year tops. Essentially, if I jump from my current, milk hauling gig, to some other trucking gig in another city, pay won't seem to be all that different for the similar amount of work.
Apart from finding a 4on/3off type of scheduling arrangement, there doesn't seem to be anywhere else to take this line of work. The money's enough to keep my pickup and other expenses paid down, but nothing to really write home or brag about.
Think we "old Timers" are getting maxed out, due to the surplus of our skill set. I remember 20 years ago, my skill set was paying $20+ or better with great benefits starting out. Now your lucky to even get a starting offer at $10+, due to the surplus. Experience use to trump, education, Now seems education is over powering the experience. Once that diploma gets saturated, im sure it will revert back to experience. I switch to the access security field for commercial, and the max pay is in the upper 60k a year for a good vet in the field. Thats about much your going to make, no matter were you live. COL does have some affect on your pay scale, but they learn to keep up with the market if they look around. Good luck on your end, i know how hard truck driving is. My parents been doing it for 30 years hauling pharmaceutical. They are drug haulers lol.. they bank about 90 between them. But they are 3 on, 4 off and haul with in 1500 miles from home location. Not bad gig..
I make a bit over $100k. I have been looking at other jobs in my career area, and the only jobs that pay more are in much higher COL areas, such as SF, NY and Seattle. Even so, the pay differential isn't enough to make up for the higher housing costs.
I can do a bit of a career change, but I really like what I do. I may position myself for a career change a few years before retirement to take advantage of a higher average salary for pension calculations.
Driving semi trucks, I feel as though I've hit the upper end of the payscale as far as it all goes. There's been wild stories and accounts of company drivers in the foodservice and Less-than-truckload segments hitting these near-$100k/year figures. But when calling around to different jobs before applying to them, I'm usually being given more realistic, ballpark figures of $50k-$70k/year tops. Essentially, if I jump from my current, milk hauling gig, to some other trucking gig in another city, pay won't seem to be all that different for the similar amount of work.
Apart from finding a 4on/3off type of scheduling arrangement, there doesn't seem to be anywhere else to take this line of work. The money's enough to keep my pickup and other expenses paid down, but nothing to really write home or brag about.
Talking no smack whatsoever about the vital work (to the economy) that you do, it would seem self-evident that for trades like truck driving, there must be a sweet spot in terms of work-life balance and mileage. Whatever that income is, through your own discovery seems you're at it. The $100k roles sound exotic and rare, and they (the anomalies) happen in many professions, but they are not the norm. As you've discovered.
So I'd say: if you're in that sweet spot, at whatever pay, there in fact may be nowhere to go *unless* you perform work that requires more 1) hours 2) widgets hauled per load 3) type of widgets hauled that commands a premium. I'm guessing on 2) and 3) , assuming hazardus pays more, but I'm not in the business.
At this point, the tough decision is: 1) leave the field, and take a pay cut until you've worked up to a higher level in a new career that has absolute limits much higher than what you're currently doing, or 2) seek contentment in the pay and work/life balance you've currently found.
If your field will be obsolete soon, there may be downward pressure on wages over time which could start to force your hand in c. 10 years. I saw it happen several times in IT, my field, with offshoring. I'd look at megatrends. Being in the middle of IT trends, and curious about AI and vehicles that gradually become more autonomous by the month, my guts are that in 20 years there will be a LOT of self-driving vehicles, 50% or more. People don't seem to understand that while in its infancy now, they're already making huge strides and it's only public perception plus planning for those 1:1,000,000 cases where a mistake kills 10 people in a wreck that is holding things back. That will be resolved, it's a math (algorithm) and computing power question, no more or less.
In 30-40 years, the vast bulk of vehicles will be AI controlled from start to finish, we wouldn't even have this conversation it'd be so obvious: I'd bet every cent I have on it. I won't stretch it beyond that, but it's a fair and educated guess. Try not to go obsolete. I personally saw exactly where Amazon and eBooks were going back end of the 1990s, working for a household-name tech major in the same town, and my only surprise is that it's taken people this long to notice that Amazon or others like them will annihilate retail given sufficient time. For example...
Talking no smack whatsoever about the vital work (to the economy) that you do, it would seem self-evident that for trades like truck driving, there must be a sweet spot in terms of work-life balance and mileage. Whatever that income is, through your own discovery seems you're at it. The $100k roles sound exotic and rare, and they (the anomalies) happen in many professions, but they are not the norm. As you've discovered.
So I'd say: if you're in that sweet spot, at whatever pay, there in fact may be nowhere to go *unless* you perform work that requires more 1) hours 2) widgets hauled per load 3) type of widgets hauled that commands a premium. I'm guessing on 2) and 3) , assuming hazardus pays more, but I'm not in the business.
At this point, the tough decision is: 1) leave the field, and take a pay cut until you've worked up to a higher level in a new career that has absolute limits much higher than what you're currently doing, or 2) seek contentment in the pay and work/life balance you've currently found.
If your field will be obsolete soon, there may be downward pressure on wages over time which could start to force your hand in c. 10 years. I saw it happen several times in IT, my field, with offshoring. I'd look at megatrends. Being in the middle of IT trends, and curious about AI and vehicles that gradually become more autonomous by the month, my guts are that in 20 years there will be a LOT of self-driving vehicles, 50% or more. People don't seem to understand that while in its infancy now, they're already making huge strides and it's only public perception plus planning for those 1:1,000,000 cases where a mistake kills 10 people in a wreck that is holding things back. That will be resolved, it's a math (algorithm) and computing power question, no more or less.
In 30-40 years, the vast bulk of vehicles will be AI controlled from start to finish, we wouldn't even have this conversation it'd be so obvious: I'd bet every cent I have on it. I won't stretch it beyond that, but it's a fair and educated guess. Try not to go obsolete. I personally saw exactly where Amazon and eBooks were going back end of the 1990s, working for a household-name tech major in the same town, and my only surprise is that it's taken people this long to notice that Amazon or others like them will annihilate retail given sufficient time. For example...
About the only type of trucking that seems to pay anything more per load or hour is the oil field production related work. I hear wild stories of crude haulers making $500/day transporting crude from storage tanks near the pumpjacks to the holding tanks near railroad or pipeline transport facilities. Of course while these guys tend to have work for far longer than the rest of the oilfield people, their pay tends to see-saw with the market trends and such.
As far as other trucking goes and type of cargo hauled, I have yet to see anyone paid a different rate for the pieces on the truck. There's grocery/foodservice hauling where each box pulled off the trailer is paid in addition to hourly or mileage compensation. But after applying to a few different carriers that service the grocery/restaurant industry, their weird hours and days off that are offered were more than enough to turn me off and blow off the job offer. I wouldn't say I burned a bridge, but I probably shouldn't bother reapplying to any of those.
When it comes to taking a severe paycut to getting reeducated into a different field, I'll probably have to wait for that. Unless I want to risk having some repossessions on my credit file, I'll have to work off my mistake of a pickup truck purchase until it's finally paid off. Then of course there's making just enough money while working towards a certificate or degree to make sure a roof remains over my head and the schooling is paid for. I excel in other subjects, but the other jobs I do want to get into require advanced math courses and financial aid only helps you up to so many pass/fail attempts. And loans are out of the question, not going for any of those despite how much pressure gets put on you by students that actually know what they're doing.
All in all, I know I could weather a smooth transition out of this career into some other profession of which I have no clear idea. But it's going to be a very, slow process that could take another 10-15 years. All I know is that retirement's a myth at this point and I'll have to some "soft employment" backup plan in place once I hit those upper years.
I could easily accelerate my salary 2 to 5 times what it is today as a cpa if I got to senior levels of management.
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