Pumpkin, there is nothing wrong with being contradictory. Without that, forums wouldn't be any good
Someone who has just completed a residency would be in a better position to provide information, but I'll relate the story of my parents for those interested. They are both american and from california. Both did not get into UC schools and both went to ross in 1980(they were married at the time. I was a toddler when they went but did not make the trip with them).
They both did pretty well on their boards. Not great but above average. My mom took a residency position in path and my dad started off in IM but hated it and later switched to path. Different residency programs but both were in the same city. Not top-notch academic leading type programs, but decent programs. My father did a fellowhip after residency(surg path). Now my mom works in a very small outpatient pathology group(3 paths total) and my dad is employed by a hospital system. He makes a little more than the national average listed in pathology surveys and she makes a little less. He also works more than her though. They both seem to enjoy their career.
Were they unable to make 250-350k as a partner like everyone says is common because they were IMG's?? I really doubt that had anything to do with it. They are both american, speak perfect english, and fit in well everyone. The fact that they were IMG's certainly limited their options in academic medicine, but they weren't interested in this anyway. I really don't think the private pracice community of pathologists(which is half IMG anyway) cared that they were IMG. All they were concerned about was how well/efficiently they could perform. If they had been IMG's of indian/eastern european/arab ethnicity then I could see the argument that their IMG status really held them back, but they don't believe it has been a factor and I'm inclined to believe them. And yet they never approached this 300k figure that is commonly thrown around. The published salary numbers also don't come close to this number. I'm sure there are paths making 300k, but they clearly don't represent the typical pathologist.
You point out that 60% of matching students last year were US grads. Wouldn't that mean that of all the specialties, path would have the third highest ratio of matching IMG's? (I'm not sure if psych would be greater or less). From my perspective, a field in which 4/10 residents are non-US grads is just not competitive. Not that there is anything wrong with a field not being competitive, but let's not pretend that it is when 40% of recent matches are IMG. Ultra-competitive fields like ortho, derm, urology, and opth. have less than 3% IMG matches. Competitive fields like EM and radiology may have slightly higher numbers of IMGs matching, but it's still an unrealistic dream for most IMGs to match into this field. A more realistic dream is for an IMG to get a categorical surg spot, obgyn, or anesth. I don't have the exact %'s of categorical surg and obgyn, but I'm pretty sure the IMG % is less than 1/4. The finally, you have the easy matches for IMG's....psych, path, and community IM/FP programs. Heck even a highly ranked program like UNC has a few IMG's, including a US IMG from AUC. Maybe pathology will one day make a big swing and become competitive(look what happened in radiology and radonc), but to do so I think salaries will have to come way up. If the salaries stay where they are, the IMG% of matching students will always be high. I don't think it's possible to underestimate the role salary plays matching. For example:
1) Radonc salaries skyrocket. All of a sudden it went from an easy match to a very tough match.
2) Radiology salaries go high. Same thing as radonc.
3) OBGYN malpractice rates skyrocket and suddenly obgyn becomes less competitive.
Now it's common for a radiologist to make 300k. Now it's uncommon for an IMG to match. It's common for a pathologist to make 150k. Therefore it's easy for an IMG to match. The correlation between salaries and matching competitiveness is almost perfect.
The < 100k comments mainly refer to some forensics and gov't positions. I asked my parents and they also don't know of any private full-time path positions that pay < 100k, although they know of some that pay 110-130k.
I'm not trying to discourage anyone from pathology. If you love it and it's what will make you happy, then go for it. But if you want to be paid a lot, there are better fields. And if you want to work 40-48 hrs/week, there are also better fields(derm, pm&r, non-retina optho, maybe psych)
