2015 job Market

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keifernny2

keifernny2

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What do those in the Psych job market think about 2015?

From what I'm seeing, it looks like employer demand is up significantly.

I'm wondering if the VA (and loan repayment incentives) and other govt jobs are pushing up the lower end of Salary range which forces the higher end salaries up as well...
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Once you complete residency/fellowship, you'll qualify for a GS-15 position. The loan repayment is a bit of a scam for the VA where you pay up front. The pay isn't much better in comparison to other perks from PP plus W2 wages are eaten alive by taxes compared to 1099. There are a lot of facilities with less red tape and bureaucratic bull$#!* than what the VA offers you, plus you can get healthy sign-on bonuses, moving expenses, CME, etc all paid for because the demand across the nation/world for Psychiatry is growing.
 
Shikima said:
Once you complete residency/fellowship, you'll qualify for a GS-15 position. The loan repayment is a bit of a scam for the VA where you pay up front. The pay isn't much better in comparison to other perks from PP plus W2 wages are eaten alive by taxes compared to 1099. There are a lot of facilities with less red tape and bureaucratic bull$#!* than what the VA offers you, plus you can get healthy sign-on bonuses, moving expenses, CME, etc all paid for because the demand across the nation/world for Psychiatry is growing.
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Psych residency spots have been increasing by several hundred spots the past few years though. I wonder if this will ever catch up to the field and bite it in the ass.
 
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Baller MD said:
Psych residency spots have been increasing by several hundred spots the past few years though. I wonder if this will ever catch up to the field and bite it in the ass.
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I'm not thinking so. Would be interesting to see what the average age of physicians is across the board for all specialties.
 
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Well, my thoughts were less VA oriented and more oriented into the overall market. The VA just happens to be a 2000lb gorilla at the bottom of the market.

As an example, (only using the VA because it is so large), Psychiatrists appear to have gotten a 10% pay raise (or more) over the last year.

Previously, the local non-profit hospital with inferior benefits only had to beat the VA 20k to be attractive to an applicant, now they may have to beat them by 40k. The for-profit hospital system will need to beat them by 50k to be attractive.

So my big question is, is anyone else seeing this actually happen yet?

This, of course, discounts the need for H1/J1 waivers and the historical use of them by some community hospitals to lock in physicians at below-market rates.


It's kind of like how Walmart announced yesterday that they're raising salaries for their employees. Hypothetically, all of the companies that already pay slightly better than walmart for jobs where you work more, will have to raise their salaries as well. If they don't, all their employees would be crazy not to just leave and go work for Walmart.
 
Baller MD said:
Psych residency spots have been increasing by several hundred spots the past few years though. I wonder if this will ever catch up to the field and bite it in the ass.
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Not so much...it might be up a couple of hundred per year in the past 8 years, but that was after a similar quantity of reductions in the late 90s/early00s. It's just back to where it was in the early 90s now, and I 'd argue that demand is substantially higher now.
http://www.psychiatry.org/file library/learn/residents/resident census/census-11-12.pdf
 
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Shikima said:
You have to pay out of pocket before you see any money - I feel the purpose in loan repayment is to help an individual pay the loans.
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What the VA does is match whatever you paid on student loans up to about $24,000 in a lump sum check to you at the end of the year. They do this for five years to promote physician retention, until they hit $120,000. Thats double the previous maximum allowable. It seems fair to me.
I haven't run into any organizations that can do better, if you hear of any let me know! One other contract I saw when job hunting the max the organization was willing to assist me with was $70,000 after 6 months employment, with the caveat I'd have to pay it back if I quit, and have to keep my RVUs up to a certain level. Most places weren't that generous.
 
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From my understanding , all non-federal loan repayment programs are simply taxable income anyway and could just as easily be labeled as a "performance bonus"
 
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I forsee the non-profits having to increase avg salaries to $300k by the end of 2015 in order to compete effectively with the VA.

I'm looking for a new job now (as the funding for my current job is ending in a few months), and am quite pleasantly surprised by the offers I'm getting.

The difficult and hard-to-fill jobs may go up to $350k. I did hear of one perm job advertising $400k in an extremely undesireable area, but still with RVU only at the 50%ile, and I have already seen multiple at $350k.

There may be a delay as lots of people are stuck in contracts and can't renegotiate right away, and many more have less leverage due to visa issues.

At some point, though, there must be a maximum cap as hospitals would rather just close down units rather than cut into their profit margin on them. (ie: if they can make more money turning those beds into medical beds than psych beds, they will).

As an aside, I'm also starting to not look at any non-govt job anymore as permanent, because health executives are chasing dollars. The likelihood of anyone staying long enough to earn the 20 year pension is getting lower and lower outside of govt service, (and possibly even with govt service) so you might as well take as much as you can up-front.
 
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F0nzie said:
I always had a feeling the DMV was on the cutting edge. Also there is something very satisfying about taking a number and looking at the digital counter.
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"Now serving number 16" blares clearly over the loudspeaker .... as you notice your ticket say 84.
 
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wolfvgang22 said:
What the VA does is match whatever you paid on student loans up to about $24,000 in a lump sum check to you at the end of the year. They do this for five years to promote physician retention, until they hit $120,000. Thats double the previous maximum allowable. It seems fair to me.
I haven't run into any organizations that can do better, if you hear of any let me know! One other contract I saw when job hunting the max the organization was willing to assist me with was $70,000 after 6 months employment, with the caveat I'd have to pay it back if I quit, and have to keep my RVUs up to a certain level. Most places weren't that generous.
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There are many out there willing to pay at least $120,000 for loans. One graduate from Davis got offered $150,000. I had a recruiter send me a job offer that covered $130,000. They're out there.

Glad to see Red Tape King VA up its game, but don't think it's the best game in town. Cause it ain't.
 
Leo Aquarius said:
There are many out there willing to pay at least $120,000 for loans. One graduate from Davis got offered $150,000. I had a recruiter send me a job offer that covered $130,000. They're out there.

Glad to see Red Tape King VA up its game, but don't think it's the best game in town. Cause it ain't.
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No offense intended, but I'm always a bit skeptical when a resident says these kinds of things.
So I have to ask, what sort of positions are you talking about? Inpatient, or oupatient? Amount of call, admissions, hours? Because, yeah, I can pull a Benzo and make $400k a year with $150K bonus, but I'd be working my butt off.

Regarding red tape, maybe I'm in a super special situation, but I don't face much red tape than compared to residency or fellowship, it's about the same where I work. I do believe I work in one of the best departments in the country as far as the VA goes. In fact, we get told that a lot by auditors.

Now the veterans, yeah, they face a ton of red tape I wish I could make disappear. It takes them months to get benefits - basically just like when people try to get Social Security Disability in the community. (It's a very similar patient population in a lot of ways.)
 
Leo Aquarius said:
There are many out there willing to pay at least $120,000 for loans. One graduate from Davis got offered $150,000. I had a recruiter send me a job offer that covered $130,000. They're out there.

Glad to see Red Tape King VA up its game, but don't think it's the best game in town. Cause it ain't.
Click to expand...

If a job needs a recruiter to lure you in, there's a reason for that.
 
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Still in Medical school and have a job recruiter from one of places I have done rotations talking to me and the other students. Interesting
 
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Most places do use recruiters, even academic medical centers. However, in my limited experience, if a place is using a recruiter there is a reason: lower than average pay, more rural location, long hours, lots of call, etc. If a hospital knows that they can fill a job through word of mouth within a few months, they won't use a recruiter at first (this is how my residency and fellowship hospital and current hospital all approach it.) They can both save money and offer a sweeter deal to a potential employee by not using a recruiter sometimes.

I trust in-house recruiters at hospitals a little more than third party recruiters. This is just because they seem more up front, seem to be able to get important information better because the recruiter is at the hospital, and have had better offers available when I've talked to them.

Anyway, I'm interested in Leo Aquarius showing me good jobs with a reasonable workload that are offering $150K or more of student loan repayment. Recruiters say all kinds of things, but then when I look at the contracts offering huge bonuses I find that if you don't meet a high RVU production benchmark the salary gets cut substantially in the second year, or there is a draconian non-compete clause, or the last five psychiatrists quit after a month on the job. I'd love to know that I've just seen a bunch of bad offers.
 
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450-550k in a major metro (working hard and fellowship trained), an extra 200k is better than va loan repayment
 
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wolfvgang22 said:
What the VA does is match whatever you paid on student loans up to about $24,000 in a lump sum check to you at the end of the year. They do this for five years to promote physician retention, until they hit $120,000. Thats double the previous maximum allowable. It seems fair to me.
I haven't run into any organizations that can do better, if you hear of any let me know! One other contract I saw when job hunting the max the organization was willing to assist me with was $70,000 after 6 months employment, with the caveat I'd have to pay it back if I quit, and have to keep my RVUs up to a certain level. Most places weren't that generous.
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Does anyone have a link to the specifics of the new VA loan repayment program? All I can find online is info about the old program with 10k annual cap and 60k total
 
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wolfvgang22 said:
What the VA does is match whatever you paid on student loans up to about $24,000 in a lump sum check to you at the end of the year. They do this for five years to promote physician retention, until they hit $120,000. Thats double the previous maximum allowable. It seems fair to me.
I haven't run into any organizations that can do better, if you hear of any let me know! One other contract I saw when job hunting the max the organization was willing to assist me with was $70,000 after 6 months employment, with the caveat I'd have to pay it back if I quit, and have to keep my RVUs up to a certain level. Most places weren't that generous.
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NIH/NIMH loan repayment can be up to $35k/year, but you'd have to be doing NIH/NIMH-sponsored research. The VA program is still probably more lucrative overall, since the salary differential between entry-level VA jobs and entry-level academic jobs is usually enough to more than compensate for that difference... but it's a nice perk for those of us who want to go into academia but are afraid to take that pay cut because of oodles of student loans...
 
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wolfvgang22 said:
What the VA does is match whatever you paid on student loans up to about $24,000 in a lump sum check to you at the end of the year. They do this for five years to promote physician retention, until they hit $120,000. Thats double the previous maximum allowable. It seems fair to me.
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I thought in EDRP they would give you $24k per year as long as there was some payment shown into your student loans.
Do you have to show that you spend that $24k onto your loans, and does it have to be an entire $24k spent on your loans.?
Does working for VA qualify for PSLF?

If yes, then if you have a 2 physician household with both having many student loans (say $200k each). Can you then work for VA, get the PSLF, and use some of th $24k/ year for both loan repayments?

The entire program is complicated. Here is the description written in 2012: http://www.va.gov/vhapublications/ViewPublication.asp?pub_ID=2700

Here is an interesting piece I found on page 16 (bottom)
b. Although the statutory maximum EDRP award amount is currently $60,000, HRRO, VISN and medical center managers are not required to award this amount to a participant, but May 31, 2012 VHA HANDBOOK 1021.01 17 may award any amount up to this limit or cap on the basis of availability of funds and recruitment and retention needs.

So how much are we expect to get?
 
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Igor4sugry said:
I thought in EDRP they would give you $24k per year as long as there was some payment shown into your student loans. Anyone have EDRP program description?
Do you have to show that you spend that $24k onto your loans, and does it have to be an entire $24k spent on your loans.
Does working for VA qualify for PSLF?

If yes, then if you have a 2 physician household with both having many student loans (say $200k each). Can you then work for VA, get the PSLF, and use some of th $24k/ year for both loan repayments?
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I've got a link at work, but not with me here. I don't know if you can use PSLF also, I'm gonna look into that also. If you find out first let us know.

I do know you can only use EDRP only for the VA employee's student loans, not your non-VA employee spouse, and only for the loans that led directly to the degree you are using at work (med school, not undergrad or other graduate school.) The program only matches what you pay in. $24K a year for five years is the max ($2,000 per month). You can request a smaller matching amount. If you pay in less after asking for $24K at the end of a fiscal year, they will probably match that instead, but you have to ask and fill out another request form. You have to promise up front that you are going to pay a certain amount per month to student loan, and be able to provide documentation you actually paid. It takes 6 months to get approved for the program, but that's not as big a deal since they just cut you a check at the end of the fiscal year anyway.

My NP just got hers approved, she's pretty happy about it. I'm waiting still and I applied 3 months ago. I told them I'll be considering moving on if it's not approved, so it probably will be approved, as the purpose of the program is staff retention. I also know that each VA is allowed a certain amount of EDRP funds for it's staff, and is rarely granted more. EDRP funds are granted by priority - the more in demand the staff member (the harder it is to fill your job), the more likely you are to get it. Psychiatrists are in pretty high demand. Yeah, they can authorize less money than you ask for. The human resources staff at the VA can tell you roughly whether you should get it or not, based on the demand for the EDRP at that particular hospital. Mine said it shouldn't be a problem in my case. If it does become a problem, well, I may very likely move on.

Edit: That $60K information you found is old information. The maximum EDRP is $120K now for physicians, just got bumped up last summer after they found there was a lack of physicians in Phoenix contributing to long wait times for veterans.
 
wolfvgang22 said:
I've got a link at work, but not with me here. I don't know if you can use PSLF also, I'm gonna look into that also. If you find out first let us know.

I do know you can only use EDRP only for the VA employee's student loans, not your non-VA employee spouse, and only for the loans that led directly to the degree you are using at work (med school, not undergrad or other graduate school.) The program only matches what you pay in. $24K a year for five years is the max ($2,000 per month). You can request a smaller matching amount. If you pay in less after asking for $24K at the end of a fiscal year, they will probably match that instead, but you have to ask and fill out another request form. You have to promise up front that you are going to pay a certain amount per month to student loan, and be able to provide documentation you actually paid. It takes 6 months to get approved for the program, but that's not as big a deal since they just cut you a check at the end of the fiscal year anyway.

My NP just got hers approved, she's pretty happy about it. I'm waiting still and I applied 3 months ago. I told them I'll be considering moving on if it's not approved, so it probably will be approved, as the purpose of the program is staff retention. I also know that each VA is allowed a certain amount of EDRP funds for it's staff, and is rarely granted more. EDRP funds are granted by priority - the more in demand the staff member (the harder it is to fill your job), the more likely you are to get it. Psychiatrists are in pretty high demand. Yeah, they can authorize less money than you ask for. The human resources staff at the VA can tell you roughly whether you should get it or not, based on the demand for the EDRP at that particular hospital. Mine said it shouldn't be a problem in my case. If it does become a problem, well, I may very likely move on.

Edit: That $60K information you found is old information. The maximum EDRP is $120K now for physicians, just got bumped up last summer after they found there was a lack of physicians in Phoenix contributing to long wait times for veterans.
Click to expand...

I wanted to help clarify, yes that you do qualify for PSLF working at a VA hospital. Caveat, I'm not sure if all VA hospitals qualify.
 
I do not have a lot of experience job shopping in psychiatry, but I am the filter that keeps the endless sea of recruiters at bay as they try and get personal e-mails and phone numbers of our trainees. Almost everyone now does use head hunters, but the best academic hires I have seen have always been filled by knowing someone and networking. As far as non-academic jobs, the higher the pay, the less likely it will be a good work environment. Too good to be true is mostly too good to be true. Large organizations that maintain a standing print add in psych times or something isn’t a red flag as these type of employers always have openings. I would be leery of standing adds for a specific position that has been on the market for months and months. These tend to be in two flavors:
  1. Come be a leader in a family friendly Midwest academic/University setting. We have had a string of 7 different acting chairs over the last decade, but don’t worry; our dean will have confidence in you.
Or
  1. Inpatient junior faculty position with high patient volume and low pay. Come be a part of a department that will expect you to cherish the shear honor of being a part of our faculty. Our excellent private practice opportunities will allow you to keep almost $0.40 on the dollar and it gets even better! Although you will not be on the teaching ward, you will be able to see an occasional medical student from across the hall, but we keep the residents for our more senior faculty. Don’t wait, because we have been refilling this position on an average of every 13 months for the last 4 decades!
Actually, I’m sure every field has opportunities like these. The truth is that graduating psychiatry residents have a lot of options and it is almost always which job, not where can I find one.
 
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Midwest Metro Psychiatry $318,000 First Year Income

Employed Traditional Psychiatry in Metro Midwest
Excellent Salary, Sign-on and Benefits
1:8 Telephone Only Call and NO WEEKENDS!!!
Cutting Edge Procedures Including TMS
Research Opportunities and Medical School Affiliation
Inpatient and Outpatient Opportunities
Midwest Capitol City Metro Forbes #6 best place for Business and Careers
Over 100 Parks
Unemployment Less than ½ National Average
Big 10 University with #6 Ranked Medical School in the US
Low Cost of Living 10% below the national Average
 
Shikima said:
Midwest Metro Psychiatry $318,000 First Year Income

Employed Traditional Psychiatry in Metro Midwest
Excellent Salary, Sign-on and Benefits
1:8 Telephone Only Call and NO WEEKENDS!!!
Cutting Edge Procedures Including TMS
Research Opportunities and Medical School Affiliation
Inpatient and Outpatient Opportunities
Midwest Capitol City Metro Forbes #6 best place for Business and Careers
Over 100 Parks
Unemployment Less than ½ National Average
Big 10 University with #6 Ranked Medical School in the US
Low Cost of Living 10% below the national Average
Click to expand...
What's wrong with this job?
 
Baller MD said:
What's wrong with this job?
Click to expand...
We need details on how many hours per day and how many patients per hour. If you imagine 9 hours of patient care a day with 5 patients per hour, and no scheduled documentation time, it becomes easier to see how $318K is possible. You would almost certainly be better off joining a private practice or starting a practice and taking private insurance only if you were willing to work this much. If it's an employed position the employer will want you to be creating revenue greater than your salary. The exception might be a hospital or clinic that gets county or state funding that offsets the psychiatrist salary in order to provide access to mental health care.
 
As someone who is the in the market but only looking in one spot, I'd say the market is pretty good, but it seems like most jobs have a pretty decent element of suck in there somewhere (which I guess is life and all, but I want to minimize that). From emails I'm getting, I think you can make a ton of money if you moved to an undesirable (at least to me) area. Worst location job posting to date -- Midland, TX. I can't imagine how much you would have to pay me to get me to work there.

In my location, things that aren't present, which is kind of sad, include good (to me) academic jobs (that might come in 2 years when there's a new hospital coming) and surprisingly, VA jobs (which are supposedly coming, again, but have been delayed because I guess everything at the VA is slow).
 
The catch I see with most rural jobs appears to be that there is no"cap" to patient loads, and yet employers don't want to pay extra to you for you to manage the additional patients.

This goes for VA as well as private hospitals.
 
wolfvgang22 said:
I've got a link at work, but not with me here. I don't know if you can use PSLF also, I'm gonna look into that also. If you find out first let us know.

I do know you can only use EDRP only for the VA employee's student loans, not your non-VA employee spouse, and only for the loans that led directly to the degree you are using at work (med school, not undergrad or other graduate school.) The program only matches what you pay in. $24K a year for five years is the max ($2,000 per month). You can request a smaller matching amount. If you pay in less after asking for $24K at the end of a fiscal year, they will probably match that instead, but you have to ask and fill out another request form. You have to promise up front that you are going to pay a certain amount per month to student loan, and be able to provide documentation you actually paid. It takes 6 months to get approved for the program, but that's not as big a deal since they just cut you a check at the end of the fiscal year anyway.

My NP just got hers approved, she's pretty happy about it. I'm waiting still and I applied 3 months ago. I told them I'll be considering moving on if it's not approved, so it probably will be approved, as the purpose of the program is staff retention. I also know that each VA is allowed a certain amount of EDRP funds for it's staff, and is rarely granted more. EDRP funds are granted by priority - the more in demand the staff member (the harder it is to fill your job), the more likely you are to get it. Psychiatrists are in pretty high demand. Yeah, they can authorize less money than you ask for. The human resources staff at the VA can tell you roughly whether you should get it or not, based on the demand for the EDRP at that particular hospital. Mine said it shouldn't be a problem in my case. If it does become a problem, well, I may very likely move on.

Edit: That $60K information you found is old information. The maximum EDRP is $120K now for physicians, just got bumped up last summer after they found there was a lack of physicians in Phoenix contributing to long wait times for veterans.
Click to expand...

Wolfvgang22: can you post that VA link for new loan repayment program from your work? It would be really helpful to me
 
myPsychAlt said:
If a job needs a recruiter to lure you in, there's a reason for that.
Click to expand...

There aren't enough psychiatrists around so recruiters are needed. I wouldn't read too much into it.
A lot of recruiters means the market is good. A lot of things have contributed.

1) Parity has started to play a bigger part.
2) E&M coding pays better than traditional coding.
3) The spotlight on PTSD/VA, the shootings around the country has helped also.
 
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Baller MD said:
Psych residency spots have been increasing by several hundred spots the past few years though. I wonder if this will ever catch up to the field and bite it in the ass.
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Looking at the data, the US population increased by 30.4% between 1988 and 2012, while the number of psychiatry positions increased by a mere 8.7%. The market is pretty good, because, unlike other fields where technology has been able to substantially increase the productivity of physicians (think radiology, path, etc), psych requires one-one-one time with patients. Even with midlevel encroachment, the future of psych is likely fairly bright.
 
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Mad Jack said:
Looking at the data, the US population increased by 30.4% between 1988 and 2012, while the number of psychiatry positions increased by a mere 8.7%. The market is pretty good, because, unlike other fields where technology has been able to substantially increase the productivity of physicians (think radiology, path, etc), psych requires one-one-one time with patients. Even with midlevel encroachment, the future of psych is likely fairly bright.
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When places like New York city and the SF bay area are short staffed, it really means there is a massive shortage.
Also psychiatry figures to be a major player in the upcoming telemedicine market so location won't be that important.

Many PCPs prescribe only because they can't find a psychiatrist, especially if they have to treat anything outside anxiety or depression. They also don't particularly like using benzo's or augmentation strategies. However, PCPs across the country are doing this because there isn't another option readily available.
There is room for a huge increase in psychiatrists, probably on the order of 25-33% could easily be accommodated and maybe more.
 
Indodo said:
When places like New York city and the SF bay area are short staffed, it really means there is a massive shortage.
Also psychiatry figures to be a major player in the upcoming telemedicine market so location won't be that important.

Many PCPs prescribe only because they can't find a psychiatrist, especially if they have to treat anything outside anxiety or depression. They also don't particularly like using benzo's or augmentation strategies. However, PCPs across the country are doing this because there isn't another option readily available.
There is room for a huge increase in psychiatrists, probably on the order of 25-33% could easily be accommodated and maybe more.
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Could have fooled me.
 
I know empathy is not something we discuss, teach or learn in psychiatry but try it in this specific situation. Pretend you have 15 minutes to go over labs, send referrals, discuss HTN, DM, cough and document it with a patient the 1 or 2 times they come in per year. Oh BTW doctor, I have severe anxiety!

Do they take the easy way out, sure. But get off the high horse. This is the kind of attitude that has PCPs clamoring for prescribing psychologists.
 
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Doctor Bagel said:
Me, too. They're also big fans of xanax, which psychiatrists don't particularly like using. Gross generalization, I know, and probably not fair.
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I guess everyone's experience is different. I see more psychiatrists throwing benzos at patients and pcps being more conservative.
 
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vistaril said:
I guess everyone's experience is different. I see more psychiatrists throwing benzos at patients and pcps being more conservative.
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I see the exact opposite.
 
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In my current state we have extremely robust tracking of controlled substance prescriptions and going after perceived instances of liberality with opiods or benzos is our attorney general's favorite past time, so many PCPs here just refuse to touch them.
 
Back to job markets.....ALWAYS take job information from people who don't know the nitty gritty of a job as not being very useful. That includes residents who aren't ready to actually sign a contract yet AND people out of residency who 'hear' about a job or check their email and see a few attractive bullet points. When you actually get on the phone with those jobs and prepare to fly out to meet, the details suddenly crystallize and it's not so good.

As for the VA, there is good and bad. I don't care WHAT va you are at, if you start your career at the VA and are there a long time, it is what it is- you aren't going to ever be a 'prominent'(whatever that means) psychiatrist in the area. Now sure, does the VA currently have some prominent(at least from a local perspective) psychiatrists? Sure....but they cut their teeth and made their rep in other jobs. Now that sort of thing I couldn't care one bit about, so it would be ok by me to give that up. As leo points out, there is a lot of silly rules/regs. Well that's also true of a lot of other jobs. Also, it's important to point out that wolf's starting salary(which I think he said was 220k+) is NOT typical for people just out of residency. I believe him and all, but just know that the vast majority of VAs aren't going to pay that for people just out of residency. 240k is the absolute highest salary ANY psychiatrist can be paid at the VA, and that tends to be a chief/supervisory psych with a ton of experience.....more common is the 170-80k range. Another thing to keep in mind is that the student loan repayment(at least at max levels) is far from guaranteed. Oh and the 'federal retirement' isn't what it once was.....it's 1.1% x years at highest salary.....so even if you work 25 years(your whole career essentially) and top out at 210k, you'd get about 60k a year.....and then not until retirement. That's far less generous than what it used to be.....and they take a big chunk of your check to get into PERS in first place. There is small 401k match too....about the same as everywhere else. But the PERS is so poor it's almost better if one could opt out....which Im not sure you can.

As for other jobs, some numbers being thrown around in this thread are not very realistic....I make good, but I essentially work two full time jobs. Most full time outpatient jobs are going to pay around 200. Most full time inpatient jobs maybe a little more. But the key is that after a year or so you're going to be expected to earn your own keep.....so it's just a matter of adding up your collections and subtracting your expenses(or what they count as your expenses). And a lot of that is going to be depend on what the insurances(and most importantly the mental health carveouts.....they are still out there even with the aca) pay. And most people on here have no idea what many of their local plans pay for various billing codes. I'll say that it is a mistake to just assume they pay more than medicare/aid though....some do, some don't.
 
clausewitz2 said:
In my current state we have extremely robust tracking of controlled substance prescriptions and going after perceived instances of liberality with opiods or benzos is our attorney general's favorite past time, so many PCPs here just refuse to touch them.
Click to expand...

I'm starting to see more and more referrals for anxiety with a limited script for a BZD given. I'd rather see this kind of dispo being done than the alternative where the PCP is keeping them on increasing dosages over years.
 
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