I think there are only three main possibilities to explain the posts and, honestly, it's kinda hard to tell what the answer is, and may be a mix of all of the below:
- He's making up or embellishing.
- He's thinks he's sticking it to everyone by going out of his way to get paid very little and work a ****ty job to show us all how right he is about the dire state of the psychiatry market.
- His personality, being anything like his online persona, if the social worker email is to be believed, is closing a lot of doors and preventing any nice windows from opening, something hard to do in psychiatry and a rather remarkable feat, really.
My guess is there's probably a fair amount of truth to all of the above. I'll have to post for anyone lurking or considering psychiatry that none of this rings true true at all from my experience currently working a number of different gigs and about to sign on at a place in another state that will have a total compensation package reasonably higher than $300k for 4 day work week and q8 weekend call.
Also, paying to be credentialed? Must be a regional thing as I've never heard of that. I'm credentialed at four places, none of which required a dime.
Bottom line: if you don't think you're valuable or bring anything to the table, there's always somebody out there willing to pay you less.