Considering a debt around $250,000+, is medical school worth it?

[Student144]

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[DrESQ]

Are you saying you already have $250,000 in debt and are considering medical school on top of it? Or that medical school would put you at $250,000 in debt? I think the answers will vary based on which of these you mean.

In the first instance, medical school would add, say, another $175,000 - $200,000 to the debt load (subtract scholarships, your personal financial contribution as necessary). You'd be over $400,000 in debt after school. Depending on your residency, it will be 3-7 years before you start making real attending money. Add to all of these factors the cost of living in your geographic location, and yeah, you might find that medical school is going to be way too much of a financial burden.

In the second instance, if you don't have any or much debt right now but are worried about taking on $250,000, I guess it really depends on your interest in medicine. First, there are other careers besides MD/DO where you could still be involved in medicine but take out less in loans. If you're dead set on going to medical school, then just accept that loans are part of the process and you'll have to work toward paying them off during and after residency.

In either case, this depends a lot on whether or not you want to be a physician. If your life goal is to do it, then it may be worth it to go forward with medical school. If you're unsure about medical school or really afraid to have that much debt, you might want to consider alternative options like PA, which is about half the cost

 

[esob]

Well, crunching some numbers looks like this:

Student loan payment = $2903
- Based on 7% interest and an AGI of $150k as a single filer

Take home pay = $7545
- Based on 150k salary, single filer in the state of California.

That leaves $4642 in your pocket. OFC those numbers are all worst case scenarios, so likely it will be better than that, so the question then becomes really, "is $5k+ in my pocket every month worth being a doctor" (assuming you really want to be a doctor already and are only considering whether or not you can "make a living" being one considering the debt load).

 

[Law2Doc]

If "worth it" is specifically about $, don't do it. You have to want to practice medicine first and foremost because that's what you'll be doing as much as 80 hours a week for a decade before you start to have a decent income. And that income will be less than you'll imagine as a premed.

there is a "time value" of money -- $100 earned today is worth a LOT more than $100 earned a decade from now. That's why finance wonks would apply a heavy discount rate to your doctors salary when comparing it to salaries you might earn in the nearer term.

but I don't think you ever have to get into this analysis. Because frankly if you have to use math to decide if a job like medicine is worth it, then to you it won't be.

 

[ehwhatsupdoc]

Remember to factor in interest that is still accruing while in med school and residency. Your number maybe a whole lot higher.

 

[gmbz]

If you learn how to manage your money well and budget, you will have no issue getting a great ROI.

The assumption here is that you will enjoy all of the steps along the way (Medical School, Residency, Living like a Resident to pay down debt).

 

[Labrat07]

.

 

[Giovanotto]

From a strictly economic perspective its certainly easier to do excess 200k annually in industry. If you are smart and motivated enough to get a 3.7+ and a 512+ and put up with all the bs, then you certainly have the ability to do excess 200k in most industries.

Go into medicine because you want to go into medicine.

Point me to those openings or that path.

 

[Giovanotto]

If "worth it" is specifically about $, don't do it. You have to want to practice medicine first and foremost because that's what you'll be doing as much as 80 hours a week for a decade before you start to have a decent income. And that income will be less than you'll imagine as a premed.

there is a "time value" of money -- $100 earned today is worth a LOT more than $100 earned a decade from now. That's why finance wonks would apply a heavy discount rate to your doctors salary when comparing it to salaries you might earn in the nearer term.

but I don't think you ever have to get into this analysis. Because frankly if you have to use math to decide if a job like medicine is worth it, then to you it won't be.

Not that you care, but I want to publicly disagree with you so that others who feel differently know that they aren't alone. Doing a financial analysis for your future career is just smart. Being a doctor is a job, and I doubt you'd still be doing it at 25,000USD/year, sorry. Also, good luck defining "practicing medicine" since that changes with time, location, and specialty.

 

[Law2Doc]

Not that you care, but I want to publicly disagree with you so that others who feel differently know that they aren't alone. Doing a financial analysis for your future career is just smart. Being a doctor is a job, and I doubt you'd still be doing it at 25,000USD/year, sorry. Also, good luck defining "practicing medicine" since that changes with time, location, and specialty.

It's a career with income deferred for a decade, during which time you will toil for 80 hours a week on the wards, often dealing with death, disease and bodily fluids. You will constantly be dealing with emotionally charged aspects of the human condition, seeing people at their most vulnerable, families at their saddest moments. So no, it's not just a "job". If you don't like it no amount of money is going to make the experiences palatable. While practicing medicine absolutely varies with location and specialty, there is much overlap and it's really truly not for everyone.

And while nobody could afford to do many jobs for $25k, that really misses the point of not going into something you hate for the money. This is not about the Benjamin's. A number of us career changers are, in fact, doing medicine at a financial pay cut, especially when you factor in student loans/tuition, the time value of money, and a decade of lost earnings. That was actually a common comment at med school interviews "I hope you realize you may never get back to where you are financially". But that's fine because that's not what it's about. You need to pick a career you enjoy and find fulfilling. If your focus is on money for that fulfillment this won't be the right career for you.

 

[Goro]

I am so bookmarking this!

It's a career with income deferred for a decade, during which time you will toil for 80 hours a week on the wards, often dealing with death, disease and bodily fluids. You will constantly be dealing with emotionally charged aspects of the human condition, seeing people at their most vulnerable, families at their saddest moments. So no, it's not just a "job". If you don't like it no amount of money is going to make the experiences palatable. While practicing medicine absolutely varies with location and specialty, there is much overlap and it's really truly not for everyone.

And while nobody could afford to do many jobs for $25k, that really misses the point of not going into something you hate for the money. This is not about the Benjamin's. A number of us career changers are, in fact, doing medicine at a financial pay cut, especially when you factor in student loans/tuition, the time value of money, and a decade of lost earnings. That was actually a common comment at med school interviews "I hope you realize you may never get back to where you are financially". But that's fine because that's not what it's about. You need to pick a career you enjoy and find fulfilling. If your focus is on money for that fulfillment this won't be the right career for you.

 

[Giovanotto]

Let's see here:

Financial sales
Tech Recruiter
Virtually anything in tech - if you're smart enough for med school you're smart enough for CCIE, which is shoe-in for 250k and obtainable in 6 months for very bright people.
Independent adjuster
Entrepreneur in virtually an industry
A lot of sales jobs

Most of these jobs pay commission and performance does have to be high. That said, the performance doesn't have to be any higher than it has to be in a postbac or medical school to hack it.

If you really want money, go into financial sales. If you make it, you tend to live a very easy life where you pull in $500k+ on a 30-35 hour week. A good independent insurance adjuster will do about the same. A CCIE takes 6 months of med-school type studying and is $250k almost immediately, and you will walk on water with tech companies with a CCIE

There are far easier and quicker ways of making money than 2-3 years of terrible uncertainty at a postbac involving 150-250k in lost wages, 4 years of medical school involving 250k in debt and 500k in lost wages, followed by 2-6 years of residency earning at subsistence

You forgot to add:

1)Become CEO of a large company
2)Win the lottery
3)Rob a bank
4)Roulette
5)Become an NBA player
6)Be ridiculously good lookin'

 

[QofQuimica]

Not that you care, but I want to publicly disagree with you so that others who feel differently know that they aren't alone. Doing a financial analysis for your future career is just smart. Being a doctor is a job, and I doubt you'd still be doing it at 25,000USD/year, sorry. Also, good luck defining "practicing medicine" since that changes with time, location, and specialty.

That's a straw man, because most people can't afford to do this job for $25,000/year. The kind of jobs that pay $25,000/year are the kind of jobs that require a high school diploma, not the kind of jobs that require four years of college + four years of med school + 3+ years of residency. As L2D said, the reason why physicians get paid as much as they do is in large part because of the deferral of gratification they undergo for the better part of a decade or more. And that's before you start taking into account the six figure loans, the level of responsibility, the 24-7-365 timing of health care delivery, and the emotional factors involved with caring for other human beings instead of putting together inanimate widgets on an assembly line. Speaking as someone who will be spending my Christmas and New Years holidays in the hospital with other people's families instead of home with my own: it isn't all about the money. It isn't even mostly about the money. Granted that you can ease up your schedule as an attending in many specialties (although you generally can't as a resident). But it's definitely NOT just a job like any other job. So if you're going to do this career, you either go all-in, or you need to get out.

 

[Giovanotto]

That's a straw man, because most people can't afford to do this job for $25,000/year. The kind of jobs that pay $25,000/year are the kind of jobs that require a high school diploma, not the kind of jobs that require four years of college + four years of med school + 3+ years of residency. As L2D said, the reason why physicians get paid as much as they do is in large part because of the deferral of gratification they undergo for the better part of a decade or more. And that's before you start taking into account the six figure loans, the level of responsibility, the 24-7-365 timing of health care delivery, and the emotional factors involved with caring for other human beings instead of putting together inanimate widgets on an assembly line. Speaking as someone who will be spending my Christmas and New Years holidays in the hospital with other people's families instead of home with my own: it isn't all about the money. It isn't even mostly about the money. Granted that you can ease up your schedule as an attending in many specialties (although you generally can't as a resident). But it's definitely NOT just a job like any other job. So if you're going to do this career, you either go all-in, or you need to get out.

While I agree with the rest of your analysis, I don't think I was committing any fallacies. That number could of easily been 40,000/year and it would of had the same effect. Isn't ~35k/year the average american income?(lets assume no debt) If so, would you be working for that average? I presume not. Most people are willing to postpone gratification for a future higher compensation. Medicine being what it is has nothing to do with it. It is most certainly like many other jobs. We'll have to agree to disagree, and I'm more likely to believe you're right given your experience in medicine over mine. But from where I'm standing today, I disagree.

 

[QofQuimica]

While I agree with the rest of your analysis, I don't think I was committing any fallacies. That number could of easily been 40,000/year and it would of had the same effect. Isn't ~35k/year the average american income?(lets assume no debt) If so, would you be working for that average? I presume not. Most people are willing to postpone gratification for a future higher compensation. Medicine being what it is has nothing to do with it. It is most certainly like many other jobs. We'll have to agree to disagree, and I'm more likely to believe you're right given your experience in medicine over mine. But from where I'm standing today, I disagree.

I have no debt and no dependents. I live more than comfortably on $25,000/year with no problem. I am most definitely not willing to continue to postpone the rest of my life for further compensation. F*** that. In a couple of years, I will be either going PT or quitting my job altogether. The reason I want to cut back or get out of medicine altogether has nothing to do with the money, and everything to do with the fact that I want my life back so that I can devote it to other things.

 

[Giovanotto]

I have no debt and no dependents. I live more than comfortably on $25,000/year with no problem. I am most definitely not willing to continue to postpone the rest of my life for further compensation. F*** that. In a couple of years, I will be either going PT or quitting my job altogether. The reason I want to cut back or get out of medicine altogether has nothing to do with the money, and everything to do with the fact that I want my life back so that I can devote it to other things.

May I ask what your age range is? And how for many years you've been practicing?

 

[Giovanotto]

I have no debt and no dependents. I live more than comfortably on $25,000/year with no problem. I am most definitely not willing to continue to postpone the rest of my life for further compensation. F*** that. In a couple of years, I will be either going PT or quitting my job altogether. The reason I want to cut back or get out of medicine altogether has nothing to do with the money, and everything to do with the fact that I want my life back so that I can devote it to other things.

Also, I'd just like to point out (as I assume you know) that numerous other careers such as in finance and academia require one to postpone his life. You're however, making the point that medicine is unique in that it requires an extraordinary amount of postponement or that postponing your life for X careers is also not worth it? I'm trying to understand your reasoning.

 

[jl lin]

Also, I'd just like to point out (as I assume you know) that numerous other careers such as in finance and academia require one to postpone his life. You're however, making the point that medicine is unique in that it requires an extraordinary amount of postponement or that postponing your life for X careers is also not worth it? I'm trying to understand your reasoning.

Point is, it does. If Q is saying this w/o tuition debt or any other debt and w/o dependents, that's quite significant to me.

 

[QofQuimica]

May I ask what your age range is? And how for many years you've been practicing?

I'm 40. I've been out of residency for a year and a half.

Also, I'd just like to point out (as I assume you know) that numerous other careers such as in finance and academia require one to postpone his life. You're however, making the point that medicine is unique in that it requires an extraordinary amount of postponement or that postponing your life for X careers is also not worth it? I'm trying to understand your reasoning.

I wonder if we are talking at cross purposes here. What exactly does the phrase "postponing your life" mean to you? I'll tell you what it means to me. Unlike most financial types, physicians are fiduciaries. That means you are ethically obligated to put the patient's interests first. If that means giving up weekends, evenings, and holidays, you give up evenings, weekends, and holidays. Ideally, this career should have some meaning to you, so that you even want to do it, because you are doing work that matters. If you don't feel that way, then no amount of money will compensate you adequately for the job that you do as a physician. It will become a sacrifice, and the personal cost will be too great.

I can't speak for anyone else. But while I don't hate medicine, I don't want it to be my life's focus, either. And the thing is, when your job involves dealing with people's lives, and not their finances or their consumer products or some research project, you don't have the same distantly removed sense of emotional investment. Sorry, but you just don't. Or at least, you shouldn't.

 

[Giovanotto]

I'm 40. I've been out of residency for a year and a half.


I wonder if we are talking at cross purposes here. What exactly does the phrase "postponing your life" mean to you? I'll tell you what it means to me. Unlike most financial types, physicians are fiduciaries. That means you are ethically obligated to put the patient's interests first. If that means giving up weekends, evenings, and holidays, you give up evenings, weekends, and holidays. Ideally, this career should have some meaning to you, so that you even want to do it, because you are doing work that matters. If you don't feel that way, then no amount of money will compensate you adequately for the job that you do as a physician. It will become a sacrifice, and the personal cost will be too great.

I can't speak for anyone else. But while I don't hate medicine, I don't want it to be my life's focus, either. And the thing is, when your job involves dealing with people's lives, and not their finances or their consumer products or some research project, you don't have the same distantly removed sense of emotional investment. Sorry, but you just don't. Or at least, you shouldn't.

I see what you mean, yes. Thank you for going into so much detail with me.

 

[doctorold]

In a couple of years, I will be either going PT or quitting my job altogether. The reason I want to cut back or get out of medicine altogether has nothing to do with the money, and everything to do with the fact that I want my life back so that I can devote it to other things.

Oh, Q. Reading this made me sad. For some weird reason I thought you LOVE what you do.
I wish you the best of luck.

 

[Law2Doc]

@q - although I admire physicians who take their job very seriously - and intend to be one myself some day - I'm also reminded that most of the doctors I've had haven't returned my phone calls over the years...

To be fair though you don't really know what bigger fires those doctors were putting out when they chose to defer calling you back...

While taking ones job seriously is admirable, I think Qs point is it's less optional in medicine. People are sick and dying. They hurt, things are emotionally charged. This is just a much more dangerous field to have an off day in. And nobody will care that it's Thanksgiving or xmas or the middle of the night or whatever. So you really have to really like it because what you are signing on for is more of a committment than a "job". The latter you could suffer through for the money. The former, not so much.

 

[Law2Doc]

Oh, Q. Reading this made me sad. For some weird reason I thought you LOVE what you do.
I wish you the best of luck.

To be fair, some of us on here are having a much more enjoyable (but not less stressful) time of it than Q apparently is.

But I continue to stress that this career is really truly not for everybody, it's not "just a job" in terms of obligations and expectations, and looking at what someone a decade down this path might earn all too often suckers premeds into convincing themselves it will be "worth" it. make sure you like the job function. Assume the money will be adequate, but don't weigh that as an equal factor in deciding to do this path, because at the end of the day paying your bills doing something you actually enjoy is more important than a few extra dollars a decade from now but being miserable 80 hours a week.

 

[Bryan O’Blivion]

This is really highly specific to a person's individual circumstances. As stated above, if you are already an established professional making any decent amount of money, it probably is not a financially a good decision, considering the massive debt, exorbitant interest, and opportunity cost. On the other hand, for many people, medicine often represents the best opportunity they will ever get. If you are an average sort of person who has a fairly unmarketable degree, few practical skills, and you live in a backwater economically depressed part of the country, you'd probably better take it. As like as not, you'll burn up your youth with dead end jobs trying to make ends meet anyway.

If you are a recent graduate of a prestigious institution with lots of connections, this might be a different story.

Just one person's opinion, but test scores and grades don't always translate into success in all areas of life.

The importance of enjoying what you do cannot be underscored. The debt and the earning potential can make a person feel trapped and miserable. If you do medical school for the sole sake of the paycheck at the end, you will most likely be unhappy. Overall, it helps to be curious about the science, interested in people's lives and circumstances, and to be able to see the chaos and the long hours as kind of an adventure.

 

[Prettypuff1]

Absolutely it is worth it to me.. being able to see and diagnose patients is worth it to me. You'll make enough money in the long run and becomes another bill.... loan forgivness there are ways to get around be stuck with that much debt

 

[QofQuimica]

@q - although I admire physicians who take their job very seriously - and intend to be one myself some day - I'm also reminded that most of the doctors I've had haven't returned my phone calls over the years.

Struggling with this myself. I did 47 hours of o-Chem this week and 22 of MCAT psychology prep. Feel a little guilty when I go to the movies or have a few drinks.

So you have some sense of what I'm talking about then. Imagine if it was a person and not a textbook.

Oh, Q. Reading this made me sad. For some weird reason I thought you LOVE what you do.
I wish you the best of luck.

It's probably fair to say that I'm a bit burned out. I guess sometimes I do love it, and sometimes I hate it, too. The opposite of "love" isn't "hate," FWIW. It's "apathy." And apathy isn't a tenable attitude in medicine.

To be fair though you don't really know what bigger fires those doctors were putting out when they chose to defer calling you back...

While taking ones job seriously is admirable, I think Qs point is it's less optional in medicine. People are sick and dying. They hurt, things are emotionally charged. This is just a much more dangerous field to have an off day in. And nobody will care that it's Thanksgiving or xmas or the middle of the night or whatever. So you really have to really like it because what you are signing on for is more of a committment than a "job". The latter you could suffer through for the money. The former, not so much.

Yes, this is what I mean. I reach the point sometimes where I hate the sound of my own name. Heh.