Is Pharmacy Financially Worth it? (An Open Letter to Prepharms)

[mentos]

I heard people say Pharm.D. is like Law school, but at least with Law school if you manage to get accepted into a Ivy League Law school, then you will get a job at a firm

Yes a top ten law or MBA school will get you connections. A top ten pharmacy school doesn't offer much more than the rest.

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[Xenophylia]

And the worst part is, its difficult to find even a RETAIL job now. A horrible RETAIL job, where you will be treated like crap constantly and use like 1% of the knowledge you actually went to school for. When people would kill for a retail job, it truly is the end of times....

 

[sozetone]

Yup I would not consider pharmacy as a career anymore. Most pharmacists are planning an exit strategy either because they expect to be laid off soon or because they hate it.

A career would be a trade like plumber or electrician. They are in demand, they can set their own hours, they can work for a company or go off on their own. I just paid $10,600 for a new boiler - the parts cost $7,000 and the plumber pocketed the $3,600 for a couple days worth of work. I got 5 quotes and this was the cheapest by far. Others were asking for $15,000-$20,000.

I know a carpenter who gave a "I don't want to do it" price for a gazebo of $25,000. He said it cost him $5,000 but the customer paid the 25k so he did it and profited $20,000 on a weekend.

Meanwhile new pharmDs are scrounging for 32 hours a week driving all over the place at $50/hr if they're lucky.

ya gotta wonder what the DM's and regionals think. do they really think we are dedicated and committed ? because most seasoned pharms are just playing the part until they expire ya know? how do these DM's and regional dm's do it ? it's like they live a lie day to day..... thats gotta eat at your conscious , (assuming you have one). mine just quit and he was good, i think he just did not want to see his market topple after all the hard work he put in, then they cut him to the bone.. he went out at the top of his game.

 

[sozetone]

And the worst part is, its difficult to find even a RETAIL job now. A horrible RETAIL job, where you will be treated like crap constantly and use like 1% of the knowledge you actually went to school for. When people would kill for a retail job, it truly is the end of times....

could also be the beginning of times.....we shall see.

 

[Xenophylia]

During my retail days, I often wondered what made someone enter the demonic ranks of management such as becoming a DM. Whatever made them drink the kool-aid? I knew some who were decent pharmacists and went on to become DMs and it turned them into complete *ssholes, as if they'd completely forgotten where they had come from. The money couldn't have been worth selling your soul over. Pretending like the company you work for isn't just an evil piece of fecal matter. Believing in meaningless metrics as if it were handed down by God. I still don't understand it....

 

[Xenophylia]

And funniest of all- despite having played this futile game for 30 years- I'm not really even sad to see pharmacy die. I'd even drive a stake through its black, withered heart myself if someone would just give me a hammer....

 

[mentos]

And the worst part is, its difficult to find even a RETAIL job now. A horrible RETAIL job, where you will be treated like crap constantly and use like 1% of the knowledge you actually went to school for. When people would kill for a retail job, it truly is the end of times....

I have to laugh everytime a pre-pharm or pharmacy student says they don't plan to do retail. They act as if these jobs are freely available.

During my retail days, I often wondered what made someone enter the demonic ranks of management such as becoming a DM. Whatever made them drink the kool-aid? I knew some who were decent pharmacists and went on to become DMs and it turned them into complete *ssholes, as if they'd completely forgotten where they had come from. The money couldn't have been worth selling your soul over. Pretending like the company you work for isn't just an evil piece of fecal matter. Believing in meaningless metrics as if it were handed down by God. I still don't understand it....

The DMs are just pawns for their higher ups. If there DMs don't hover over the pharmacists then the big wigs will hover over them. My old DM used to threaten us with "if we don't meet our flu shot goals then you'll have to answer to my boss yourself" but I don't think anyone cared.

 

[Xenophylia]

But funny- where I worked no one ever saw these "bosses". There were names, but no faces. Some of us questioned whether the "bosses" were even real people or just formless things used to threaten and torment the help into submission. And these entities NEVER spoke to the grunts directly. Nor did they ever appear at the stores in person. Kind of like the wizard of oz- no one really behind the curtain....