I recently retired and considering returning as a contractor for a position that is very specific to my 30+ years experience. For those of you in a similar situation, how much pay were you able to demand? More or less than your XOM salary? Since you are not bound by the XOM pay secrecy rules, would you be willing to share a generic description of your contractor position and hourly or daily rate?
8 replies (most recent on top)
If xom is o ly paying 400 a day I'd cut xom and find some other folks to work with. You're missing out on a lot at that rate.
Your rate as a contractor is based on market rates for similar experience vs. your EM salary.
You're not sharing your position, OP.
Sitting on the fence - all I know.
I know PhDs s in the 2000s that were making from 200 to 400 dollars a hour. They were limited to the max of 10 to 20 hours a week though. You can always get more than your old pay scale because they don't have to provide benefits. Be careful of the tax burden if you are a retiree it could push you into a much higher tax bracket.
p
For deepwater well construction, my day rate was $2500/day plus expenses. But my position was a 28/28 position so, on days off as a contractor, the day rate drops to zero.
This rate ended up being about the same when I was working as a employee at $328,000 year (again 28/28 rotational position). I am an engineer.
10 years ago when it was the norm to hire annuitants, I heard that the day rate was related to final 2 years of employment.
I do not know the factors used to calculate.
If you're upstream and near a wellhead I would imagine your day rate would be about ~1400 to ~2000 a day depending on your location and function.
Pay secrecy rules aren't legal. Per the National Labor Relations Act, everyone is legally allowed to openly talk about pay. You're just not allowed to divulge anyone else's private information. Exxon, and every other large corporation, has just been run by people like you who just continue to perpetuate the same fallacy and punish people for other causes when they do something the company doesn't like.
That being said, I know contractors who were on $1,000/day rate for specialized jobs.