Does anyone have a breakdown as to how much you would make as a dentist working in the army for 4 years including the base pay and all the extra pay and housing and stuff plus all the benefits you receive during dental school?
HPSP Program Pay Breakdown?
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It's pretty simple to look up and find info so I'll just give you estimates. As a student, all tuition/required fees are covered and reimbursed. You also receive around a $2122/month stipend (increases slightly each year) as well as a 20K sign on bonus if you go with Army or Navy. When you graduate, you'll make around $70-80,000 for those 4 years. I forget what the exact values are but that's a close estimate.
Yea I actually just looked at the pay charts online and that's what I calculated as well. So you also receive that additional special pay of $10,000 each year?
Does anyone know about the benefits you would receive once you retire? Let's say I left after serving my contracted 4 years... do I receive any money after that? If I recall correctly you start receiving retirement benefits once you hit around 46 years old? What are those retirement benefits and do you receive anything from the time you leave the military after 4 years of service until that retirement age of 46?
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You'd only get a retirement pension after at least 20 years of qualifying service. The only benefits you will leave with after 4 years is the pride of serving your country and the GI Bill (you may be able to transfer it later to spouse or kids but don't know about all the rules there).
When you hear the term "retired military member" that typically means they either served at least 20 years or maybe a little less if they had a debilitating military-related injury.
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Meh, if it's only around 70-75k a year then it's not worth it. Sure you get around 96,000 throughout undergrad + that 20,000 bonus but I'm in a position where my parents would pay for dental school so even though I'd rather have them save that money... if the salary was more so around 125k then I'd do it. I'm sure I could make around 150k out of dental school if I choose the right location. Plus the ENORMOUS pro that you won't be the military's b*tch for 4 years and don't have a ton of control of what you want to do with your life.
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I fail to see the productive meaning of this post, other than belittling student dentists trying to get their education funded and help serve our country. Most of us don't have parents that will front the cost of dental school.
Edit: And it is very much worth it, and not just for finances.
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you don't do it for the salary.........................
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The scholarship will be worth around half a million dollars for me during my 4 years in school. Afterwards, I have a guaranteed job and no debt, with at least 4 years worth of decent salary to put almost solely into savings/investment which I can put towards opening my own practice, again with much less/little to no debt compared to my counterparts. Will you come out of dental school making 150k? Probably not. I'm glad mommy and daddy can pay for you education. I could ask the same of mine, but I'd rather make my own way. I could have told you from the beginning that if you didn't want to serve your country and those that help defend it, you don't deserve this scholarship in the least bit. Sorry to come off rather harsh, but try not to post so sophomorically.
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As much as I would like OP to understand the gravity of these posts...there's no educating the ignorant.
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Well it's called "serving your country" for a reason. You're not able to do all the self-serving things you may as a civilian.
Aside from the huge benefit of serving those who fight for our country and having a decreases debt load there are a few benefits that many miss.
- complete medical + dental coverage for yourself, spouse and kids.
- GI Bill (value of this is pretty staggering if used in right way. Can use yourself for some civilian specialty programs. Can transfer to spouse or kids)
- ability to enter specialty residency programs (most have much lower competition than civilian side) and have much higher income during residency (making there little downside to doing a residency).
- much of your income (housing allowance) is non-taxable.
- thrift savings plan + retirement matching.
- able to live and work in places you'd otherwise never get to (or afford to like San Diego, Germany, Spain, Japan, Seattle, Hawaii just to name a few)
- be able to be part of a proud networking community far deeper than any school alumni network or college fraternity will give you. Will give you instant trust and respect and bring you patients in your civilian practice solely on this.
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I would recommend you do not joint the military for a couple reasons.
First, the pay is a bit better than you just described, but not by much. My understanding is that it is around 80K-85K depending on location. The financial benefit comes from avoiding dental school cost of attendance and associated interest. For some, including me, this means that to make up the difference I would have to average nearly $210,000 per year my first four years out (ignoring tax benefits such as reduced federal income tax and and a non-existent state income tax). For you, there is no apparent benefit, compared with having your parents pay your way.
Second, this decision shouldn't be purely financial anyway. I't a commitment to something outside yourself. You'll hate it, complain about it constantly, and therefore as an extra bonus make life less enjoyable for people like me.
Good luck with your decision. I know you'll make the right one.
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I also might recommend "borrowing" the money from your parents rather than taking it. A loss of $200K - 500K will probably hurt their retirement prospects somewhat unless they are rich (not just upper-middle class).
I bet more than 90% of people who do this program do it for the money, not because they are interested in serving their country. As a dentist, I do want to make good money, there's nothing wrong with that as I'm not doing it solely for the money, because I would enjoy it too. When I get out of dental school I want to have a job that I will make good money. Sorry if I seem like an ignorant and spoiled person(which I am not), but to me 70-75k is not good money. Sure I may not hit the 150k mark straight out of dental school but I know for a fact I can make at least 125k if I choose the right location. Then you have the freedom of living your life and not being held back by military obligations.
If I had to pay for dental school, I think it's a damn great opportunity as you're getting a GREAT deal financially, just do 4 years and get out. But it's not worth it if I don't have to, again not some typical arrogant spoiled rich kid, it's just the truth, my parents want to pay for it and definitely don't want me in the military.
If I had to pay for dental school, I think it's a damn great opportunity as you're getting a GREAT deal financially, just do 4 years and get out. But it's not worth it if I don't have to, again not some typical arrogant spoiled rich kid, it's just the truth, my parents want to pay for it and definitely don't want me in the military.
I'm going to disagree with it. Even if I wouldn't enjoy being in the military, I would very well know that going in and it would still be worth it financially sacrificing 4 years of my life in the military, and it's not like I wouldn't have freedom either. If the salary was better, for me it would be well worth it.
To me the scholarship alone is worth every penny. I'm going to a school where without the scholarship I would have 400k of debt. Assuming I take 25 years to pay it off in the end I pay 1.2 million. This doesn't include the stipend of about 112k over the fours year which includes the Active duty pay. My wife will be working as well so in dental school we'll be making money whereas a few of my friends who don't have the scholarship are racking up the interest on their loans.
When people say they plan on paying back the loan aggressively, that's assuming they won't be going into private practice or buying a house or starting a family, I think that's pretty extreme and unrealistic.
You do the scholarship if you like/tolerate the military lifestyle and/or you don't want to go into debt (private schools in particular).
When people say they plan on paying back the loan aggressively, that's assuming they won't be going into private practice or buying a house or starting a family, I think that's pretty extreme and unrealistic.
You do the scholarship if you like/tolerate the military lifestyle and/or you don't want to go into debt (private schools in particular).
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I don't think HPSP service counts towards your retirement because of the amount of money you get. You would have to serve 20 years after your 4 years of active duty following dental school.
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For those that are taking the scholarship, how do you feel about the "rumors" regarding the amalgam line and how gpr/aged skills rarely get put into practice outside of the 1 year residency while in the military?
Well considering I'm not doing gpr/aegd because I want to be a GD I have not problem with doing fillings for 4 years. I'm going to a school that is arguably one of the best clinically in the country, so 4 years of doing nothing productive to get said education for free doesn't bother me at all.
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going to a school that's best clinically means nothing (btw i go to one of the best clinical schools in the country----supposedly....so i'm giving you an honest perspective here). sure it helps, but you'll get most of your experiences in private practice/in the real world. going to a solid clinical school just gives you a leg up on others out in the real world. but, having a residency makes you a better prospective hire in the eyes of dentists. you may think you'll know everything out of school, but you won't. residencies are an invaluable experience.
and if you want to do fillings for 4 years, you are really limiting yourself. the big $$ is in implants and aesthetics. you're setting yourself up to be an average dentist by being content with just doing fillings. you should strive to be the best you can be...and that's not by just doing fillings.
I'm not disagreeing at all but we are talking about working for the navy. I'm not saying by any means that I want to do fillings for 4 years. However, it's the navy, you get told what you get to do and aesthetics are not a big part of the navy from what I know. Plus at my school the average student performs about 15 implant placements so I wouldn't have to do a residency to learn that anyways.
All I'm saying is if I were to do a residency it wouldn't be through the military because I'm just doing my time and leaving.
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it's not much different in the army, bud. the 'amalgam line' exists in all of the branches. there's no point in talking about this right now, as you haven't started dental school yet. i was the same way--4 years of school and done. you'll soon learn the value of residencies when you're in school. just make the best out of your experiences in school and go from there.
which school do you go to if you don't mind me asking?
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and i wanna add...where on earth do you expect to make $125k out of school right away? unless you have family members who are dentists willing to make you partner right away...you're not gonna see that $$ until you're a few years out. you'd prob start off at like 90-95+ incentives if anything.
What about buying a practice from someone going into retirement?
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This depends really heavily on where you live, but 500/day is not unreasonable for a new grad in a lot of places.
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It is what it is. I plan on moonlighting a bit, and maybe some CE. This is definitely a downside though. The amalgam line doesn't take everyone, but you should consider it very likely. It's definitely a bit of a downside.
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Your active duty time counts toward your retirement time, so you would have to put in another 16 years after your HPSP payback is up. So graduating at, say 25, puts your retirement at 45. At this point you probably want to be leaving as a specialist of some kind because I've heard that your time in the military tends to be more enjoyable as a specialist and the residencies get progressively easier to get into as you put time in. (Not to mention there is a considerable salary bump after becoming a specialist).
The time you spend in school does not count toward retirement. As I understand it, the time you spend in school only counts towards time in service when they are calculating your pay (your salary increases the longer you are in).
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4 years of doing an amalgam line > 25+ years of doing procedures I want with an education I can't afford
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I like your idea!
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Ah, yes, my mistake. You are absolutely correct. I was thinking of another program.
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hs2013 said:
A $20,000 sign-on bonus, plus a stipend of $2,000+ per month during school (while most other students are getting further into debt), and a salary which increases each year you are in the military giving you $80,000 -> $90,000 (not to mention tax-exempt combat pay, BHA, and allowances) on top of the fact that the military pays back all of your loans and somehow you've made the math come out to just $75k-$80k per year? You're off by miles and miles... But, if you're afraid of being a pawn and don't like taking orders, then definitely don't apply.
PS - I don't know, maybe your parents are very wealthy, but if they pay $400,000 for your education you may be unwittingly paying them back when they've retired.
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with the way school prices are skyrocketing, there's nothing wrong with doing it just for the money. for me, the $$ was just the icing on the cake. but at the same time, you have to be open minded about the military lifestyle.
and to be fair, if you're talking in terms of strictly earnings, then yes you make roughly ~70k a year.
but what @hs2013 doesn't see is that it's money going straight into your pocket---money that can be used to save up for a house, practice, etc. etc. debt is a very real thing.
side note: and it really ticks me off when people take this scholarship lightly. it's a huge investment of your time and energy. you're potentially going to be an officer in the U.S. military. you should really use some common sense and realize what you're getting into.
and to be fair, if you're talking in terms of strictly earnings, then yes you make roughly ~70k a year.
but what @hs2013 doesn't see is that it's money going straight into your pocket---money that can be used to save up for a house, practice, etc. etc. debt is a very real thing.
side note: and it really ticks me off when people take this scholarship lightly. it's a huge investment of your time and energy. you're potentially going to be an officer in the U.S. military. you should really use some common sense and realize what you're getting into.
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money wasn't the 'main' reason why you're doing it? ...
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nope, not so much. don't get me wrong, it's enticing but i had considered enlisting before that. i had other ways of paying for school that i decided not to go thru with
aka they have no retirement money or inheritance for you.
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Or worse, you have to support them in their old age when they might have been able to support themselves. $400,000 spent by his parents now is also a loss of all future interest that $400,000 would be making just by sitting in investments (assuming there are no market collapses!) My grandparents had almost $2,000,000 in their retirement fund when my grandfather died. After the economic crises of the new millenium, starting way back in 2001, their total savings was reduced to just $600,000... That's a lot of money to lose in less than a decade, especially when the plan was for them to live on the interest and pay out the full amount to their three children. Bad investments and poor diversification I suppose, but it did reduce my dad, aunt, and uncle's inheritance by a huge amount after my grandmother went to a nice (but expensive) care facility for Alzheimer's for half a decade. The condo which was supposed to be an asset needed so much work by the time they sold it that it didn't yield much of a return, and the house was so old and in need of being updated (plus the housing market sucked) so they sold it for much less than they had anticipated. But, that was a whole lot of bad luck and we can only hope doesn't happen to any of us here!
One word. Vanguard. Look them up. They diversify and allocate your money to the extreme and they have a super low fee.
I was gonna mention that as well but a brotha can only take so much. My dad could easily pay for my dental education but since he doesn't retire for 10 years he could potentially lose a lot more by giving me the money. 400k now with 10 percent annual return < 1million bucks easy
I was gonna mention that as well but a brotha can only take so much. My dad could easily pay for my dental education but since he doesn't retire for 10 years he could potentially lose a lot more by giving me the money. 400k now with 10 percent annual return < 1million bucks easy
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Exactly. Now that's thinking things through. 👍
As far as the whole taking care of parents thing, for us Asians, things work a lot differently than most white folks. Our parents do everything for us when we are kids, pay for schooling, etc. and we take care of them when they are older, not throw them in a nursing home. So not only would my parents be paying for my education, but they also are saving quite a bit for retirement, I know for a fact that, at even at a return of 4%, they should have around 2 mil by the time they retire in 15 years. So not only would they have that 2 mil, but they would also have a solid payment from social security because they've put a ton in, and they would have support from their children.
So I don't feel like I would be hindering they're retirement by them paying for my schooling.
So I don't feel like I would be hindering they're retirement by them paying for my schooling.
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As long as you're comfortable being in that position then it's not a problem. But, will you be able to put your own children through school and simultaneously support both parents if they should have some unforeseen medical condition? You can't know until it happens, if it happens. That's why I would opt for my parents to keep their money and take the military scholarship. It's not because I won't help my own parents when I am established (I am an only child, so imagine the burden I'll bear) it's more that I'd rather they have the financial security and assets to care for themselves when old age sets in and I can help out as necessary. But, the military is not for everyone, and from reading your posts I don't think you'd like it much (no offense).
