Law or Dentistry please help

[Kurk]

For the past year I've had my sights set on dentistry; the year-and-a-half before that it was medicine. Now I'm lingering in law and need guidance as to how I should proceed.

I'm an upcoming UG freshman and am set on majoring in cell-bio either way. Not going to lie, what attracts me to dentistry is the money, autonomy, and entrepreneurship opportunities. I still think I have the ideal personality (ISTJ) for both dentistry and law being detail-orientated and a bit of a perfectionist.

I've had high-school teachers tell me that I have "a good legal mind" as well as participated in mock-trial as a witness. The bulk of my upper-level classes were in advanced history and literature, but I also enjoyed and did well in the science and math classes that I took.

I understand that law is nothing like dentistry in terms of money and job security being correlated to school ranking; that being said I've begun to not care about money and leisure time anymore since I'm beginning to realize that I don't actually have any hobbies (or life) outside of schoolwork. I also never wanted to have kids and consider myself to be a skin-flint so I could live on bare-minimum wage. I've actually been watching Better Call Saul and in all honestly I could survive living in the back of a nail-salon.

All jokes aside, as a lawyer I'd be aiming to either land a sweet government job with hopes of becoming a judge, or I'd aim to be a medical malpractice lawyer so I can take some money out of the physicians' fat-ass pockets.

What is the future of dentistry? Can I expect to be a corporate slave as socialized healthcare looms around the corner? Or is there light at the end of the tunnel where I can set-up practice(s) and thrive?

And the biggest problem is that I've yet to shadow a dentist or lawyer; so yeah....I know.

Thanks

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[670206]

I would advise against law. It is extremely saturated, and the golden days of making 6 figs as a lawyer are dwindling quickly. What law school you attend also is a huge factor in obtaining a job as a lawyer. So if you do pursue that route, try to get into a top 10 school (Yale, Harvard, Chicago, etc.)

 

[wengerout]

or I'd aim to be a medical malpractice lawyer so I can take some money out of the physicians' fat-ass pockets.

 

[Kurk]

sorry I was inspired by this

 

[fit2]

Penn has DDS/law dual degree opportunity

 

[omarski]

Depending on how well you do in undergrad and how seriously you take this whole ordeal, I think you pick what you think suits you most long-term. It honestly seems like you'd have a thrill in law just from reading what you wrote and all the subtle hints at it sort of seeming like your calling. I think whichever route you go, if you get to the top of that field, you'll be incredibly successful. Obviously I don't know your capacity and honestly as a freshman undergrad, I don't think you do either, well yet... But at this point, both doorways are open still, you just gotta figure out which one you want more while also striving to be the best version of yourself academically while managing to maintain your sanity.

 

[wengerout]

sorry I was inspired by this

In all seriousness you need to shadow before you can make a call. You very well might end up hating dentistry once you shadow.

 

[fit2]

Yeah definitely keep Up your GPA, start getting involved in what you're genuinely interested in (don't do it just cause it would look good on an app or u straight up won't enjoy it much)
And start shadowing to see which lifestyle you're more interested and which suits u better

 

[FeralisExtremum]

I'm beginning to realize that I don't actually have any hobbies (or life) outside of schoolwork.

I can't give you advice on dentistry or law but I would suggest you work on this part of your life because it sounds really depressing.

 

[sgv]

Shadow all three professions. Honestly, many people will find dentistry boring. Your counselors are useless and offer no practical insight. Do not listen to them. Make the decision yourself. You can think for yourself and you know yourself best. The Meyers Briggs test is also garbage. In fact, any soft science test is garbage. If you bring up that test to anyone with a hint of statistical understanding, they will automatically think you're an idiot. The test carries no weight in determining whether you'll enjoy any kind of job. Just follow a profession around and see if you think what they do interests you. Just try hard in whatever you do. You'll go through multiple learning curves that will force you to push yourself and that you'll have to overcome. When you finish college and look back on high school, high school will seem like a joke. When you start dental school, college should feel like a joke. Residency should make dental school feel like a joke. In whatever profession you go to, in order to succeed, you have to challenge yourself. So there, one quality that is required for any of those professions is the need to constantly improve. If you do this, you'll be uncomfortable a lot. If you're comfortable then you're not improving.

Work on being a more normal person with hobbies and outside interests worth talking about with other people. When you're entering a professional field, interview selection in residency or your job will involve "clicking" with the interviewers and co-workers. That's kind of hard to do if you have no hobbies and nothing to talk about. Residency and jobs will be a team effort approach which is unlike college or dental school, where oftentimes, success is attributed to solo studying. Get used to working with other people and join a club sport or pick up other hobbies involving other people. No one wants to work with a boring or socially awkward guy or girl no matter how smart he or she is. The higher you go up, the more competitive it is and you'll sell yourself short if everyone else around you has the same high GPA and numbers as you but they're more interesting to talk to than you.

The vibe I'm getting from you is that you're after status and money. The majority of people who I've met and admit to those goals end up not reaching them unless they had a genuine interest in what they do. So be aggressive, go out and shadow a lawyer, judge, dentist, surgeon, or physician. Most of us have a genuine interest in what we do and we love to share that with other people, especially young mentees.

 

[Kurk]

Thank you everyone for their constructive criticism. It should be noted that I may have miss-phrased the part about not having a life. I do have hobbies that I could talk about with people, but I choose not to pursue them in order to put my full time, energy, and money into my future first. Then I'll have time for hobbies.

 

[fit2]

Thank you everyone for their constructive criticism. It should be noted that I may have miss-phrased the part about not having a life. I do have hobbies that I could talk about with people, but I choose not to pursue them in order to put my full time, energy, and money into my future first. Then I'll have time for hobbies.

Remember though you can't always live in the future. You gotta live in the present and enjoy today or else you'll feel like you're not living anymore and you'll never be happy. Point is haha do what you like now and plan to do something you like in the future as well

 

[Faefly]

People should want to be a lawyer because they love it not because they want to make money.
Or any profession for that matter.
If you want to make money, go start a small business. I see high schoolers starting their own business so why not you.
It makes no sense to follow one of these hard roads for money.
Where is the passion to help people?
where is the passion to be something useful in this world?

 

[Alpha Centauri]

Either way it is a great profession. Many of my friends have entered decent law schools with 60-100% scholarships. Granted law may not take in as much as a dentist, the Cost of attendance may be a lot less. However, dental gives you more freedom as long as you don't fall into the associateship trap. Even in 400k of debt dentistry is worth it IMO. The job, opportunities you have, and stability of your employment is all worth it. I never knew how bad it was out there to get a job until I heard from all my friends who are trying to enter the workforce with "just" a bachelors and near perfect GPAs. On the other hand, friends who are receiving doctorates in psychology are having issues getting hired after spending ridiculous amounts of money on tuition.

 

[Michael_Scott]

For the past year I've had my sights set on dentistry; the year-and-a-half before that it was medicine. Now I'm lingering in law and need guidance as to how I should proceed.

I'm an upcoming UG freshman and am set on majoring in cell-bio either way. Not going to lie, what attracts me to dentistry is the money, autonomy, and entrepreneurship opportunities. I still think I have the ideal personality (ISTJ) for both dentistry and law being detail-orientated and a bit of a perfectionist.

I've had high-school teachers tell me that I have "a good legal mind" as well as participated in mock-trial as a witness. The bulk of my upper-level classes were in advanced history and literature, but I also enjoyed and did well in the science and math classes that I took.

I understand that law is nothing like dentistry in terms of money and job security being correlated to school ranking; that being said I've begun to not care about money and leisure time anymore since I'm beginning to realize that I don't actually have any hobbies (or life) outside of schoolwork. I also never wanted to have kids and consider myself to be a skin-flint so I could live on bare-minimum wage. I've actually been watching Better Call Saul and in all honestly I could survive living in the back of a nail-salon.

All jokes aside, as a lawyer I'd be aiming to either land a sweet government job with hopes of becoming a judge, or I'd aim to be a medical malpractice lawyer so I can take some money out of the physicians' fat-ass pockets.

What is the future of dentistry? Can I expect to be a corporate slave as socialized healthcare looms around the corner? Or is there light at the end of the tunnel where I can set-up practice(s) and thrive?

And the biggest problem is that I've yet to shadow a dentist or lawyer; so yeah....I know.

Thanks

Law is saturated.
Don't go into something for solely the money, you are gonna hate it...
I urge you to shadow dentists and physicians and decide for yourself. You seem smart so I think you will do well but don't go for the money or prestige. Go because you like it and if you can actually do it.
PS: I know docs and dents who are lawyers also...

 

[wengerout]

People should want to be a lawyer because they love it not because they want to make money.
Or any profession for that matter.
If you want to make money, go start a small business. I see high schoolers starting their own business so why not you.
It makes no sense to follow one of these hard roads for money.
Where is the passion to help people?
where is the passion to be something useful in this world?

People do have a passion to help people/be useful in the world. However, if dentist only made 60k a year you would see a LOT of people choose different careers.

Next to no one is gonna choose a hard path without proper incentive. Plus, there are more ways than a health career to help people/be useful in the world.


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[Faefly]

People do have a passion to help people/be useful in the world. However, if dentist only made 60k a year you would see a LOT of people choose different careers.

Next to no one is gonna choose a hard path without proper incentive. Plus, there are more ways than a health career to help people/be useful in the world.


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Something useful= any job that lets you help others genuinely. I never mentioned health career. I said he should pursue a job of his choice to be something useful in this world.

 

[Medin2017]

Remember though you can't always live in the future. You gotta live in the present and enjoy today or else you'll feel like you're not living anymore and you'll never be happy. Point is haha do what you like now and plan to do something you like in the future as well

Agreed but sometimes there's a brief period (2-4 years) where hunkering down can make a big difference for your whole career. May be worth not having a life in that span of time

 

[OlderDS]

For the past year I've had my sights set on dentistry; the year-and-a-half before that it was medicine. Now I'm lingering in law and need guidance as to how I should proceed.

I'm an upcoming UG freshman and am set on majoring in cell-bio either way. Not going to lie, what attracts me to dentistry is the money, autonomy, and entrepreneurship opportunities. I still think I have the ideal personality (ISTJ) for both dentistry and law being detail-orientated and a bit of a perfectionist.

I've had high-school teachers tell me that I have "a good legal mind" as well as participated in mock-trial as a witness. The bulk of my upper-level classes were in advanced history and literature, but I also enjoyed and did well in the science and math classes that I took.

I understand that law is nothing like dentistry in terms of money and job security being correlated to school ranking; that being said I've begun to not care about money and leisure time anymore since I'm beginning to realize that I don't actually have any hobbies (or life) outside of schoolwork. I also never wanted to have kids and consider myself to be a skin-flint so I could live on bare-minimum wage. I've actually been watching Better Call Saul and in all honestly I could survive living in the back of a nail-salon.

All jokes aside, as a lawyer I'd be aiming to either land a sweet government job with hopes of becoming a judge, or I'd aim to be a medical malpractice lawyer so I can take some money out of the physicians' fat-ass pockets.

What is the future of dentistry? Can I expect to be a corporate slave as socialized healthcare looms around the corner? Or is there light at the end of the tunnel where I can set-up practice(s) and thrive?

And the biggest problem is that I've yet to shadow a dentist or lawyer; so yeah....I know.

Thanks

You should seriously consider majoring in biomedical engineering and taking prereqs for medicine and dental. Then shadow law, medicine and dental. This will allow you to keep your options open while you figure it out. If you end up in law you can be a medical patent attorney which is not saturated like most of law.

 

[blablabla1]

You should seriously consider majoring in biomedical engineering and taking prereqs for medicine and dental. Then shadow law, medicine and dental. This will allow you to keep your options open while you figure it out. If you end up in law you can be a medical patent attorney which is not saturated like most of law.

BME while doing all that is a bad idea. Very hard to maintain a good GPA, I have friends who have tried

 

[fit2]

BME while doing all that is a bad idea. Very hard to maintain a good GPA, I have friends who have tried

True engineering is super difficult to keep high GPA! Don't tire yourself out for no reason! Start shadowing ASAP in my opinion. You have a whole summer!

 

[Kurk]

What are everyone's thoughts on the future of dentistry?

I've decided to continue on my original pre-dent path and take the LSAT junior year along with the DAT. I hear it's an aptitude/IQ test which can't be mastered through the same hard work and memorization techniques that applies to the DAT so that kinda deterred me from putting my full-fledged energy behind it.

I abandoned medicine a long time ago so it won't be happening. Between Dentistry and Law in terms of purely subject matter I'd definitely go law. But knowing that dentists have the much better lifestyle, autonomy, income, side-venture opportunities, job security, etc, I'm more inclined to go that route and see if I'm lucky enough to get into a dual DDS/JD program or obtain a J.D later in life. I think of people like Orly Taitz and realize that it's definitely obtainable.

I'd be content in either field as I enjoy advising people during their time of need.

If Dentistry took a massive dump and I could only look forward to a mediocre salary (60-70k) with no opportunities for advancement then yeah I'd go law.

Anyway a few of my neighbors are lawyers so I'm glad I can use them as resources. Now all I have to do is find a dentist who is chill enough to let me shadow.

 

[670206]

What are everyone's thoughts on the future of dentistry?

I've decided to continue on my original pre-dent path and take the LSAT junior year along with the DAT. I hear it's an aptitude/IQ test which can't be mastered through the same hard work and memorization techniques that applies to the DAT so that kinda deterred me from putting my full-fledged energy behind it.

I abandoned medicine a long time ago so it won't be happening. Between Dentistry and Law in terms of purely subject matter I'd definitely go law. But knowing that dentists have the much better lifestyle, autonomy, income, side-venture opportunities, job security, etc, I'm more inclined to go that route and see if I'm lucky enough to get into a dual DDS/JD program or obtain a J.D later in life. I think of people like Orly Taitz and realize that it's definitely obtainable.

I'd be content in either field as I enjoy advising people during their time of need.

If Dentistry took a massive dump and I could only look forward to a mediocre salary (60-70k) with no opportunities for advancement then yeah I'd go law.

Anyway a few of my neighbors are lawyers so I'm glad I can use them as resources. Now all I have to do is find a dentist who is chill enough to let me shadow.

The thing is, law took a dump several years ago. Too many law grads, not enough jobs. Simple as that.

 

[wengerout]

What are everyone's thoughts on the future of dentistry?

I've decided to continue on my original pre-dent path and take the LSAT junior year along with the DAT. I hear it's an aptitude/IQ test which can't be mastered through the same hard work and memorization techniques that applies to the DAT so that kinda deterred me from putting my full-fledged energy behind it.

I abandoned medicine a long time ago so it won't be happening. Between Dentistry and Law in terms of purely subject matter I'd definitely go law. But knowing that dentists have the much better lifestyle, autonomy, income, side-venture opportunities, job security, etc, I'm more inclined to go that route and see if I'm lucky enough to get into a dual DDS/JD program or obtain a J.D later in life. I think of people like Orly Taitz and realize that it's definitely obtainable.

I'd be content in either field as I enjoy advising people during their time of need.

If Dentistry took a massive dump and I could only look forward to a mediocre salary (60-70k) with no opportunities for advancement then yeah I'd go law.

Anyway a few of my neighbors are lawyers so I'm glad I can use them as resources. Now all I have to do is find a dentist who is chill enough to let me shadow.

You really need to shadow before making that kind of decision. IMHO Law and Dentistry aren't that similar, so you might not even like dentistry.


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[738177]

You should seriously consider majoring in biomedical engineering and taking prereqs for medicine and dental. Then shadow law, medicine and dental. This will allow you to keep your options open while you figure it out. If you end up in law you can be a medical patent attorney which is not saturated like most of law.

BME grads are the family physicians of Engineers (as an example). Jack of all trades and master of none. It's difficult to land traditional engineering jobs as a BME grad without further education. BME really isn't as sexy as it sounds like.
AND they have the added benefit of being harder than a traditional Memorize and Dump bio degrees, making it difficult to obtain high enough GPA for top tier Law/Dentistry.
OP if you want law, make sure to get into a top tier law school.

 

[Kurk]

Does anyone here know if law schools give jack about what classes you take as far as their influence on admission? Will being a cell-bio major hurt me if I apply as a "failed pre-health"? I know that there are no pre-reqs but classes like political science and accounting are recommended.

 

[schmoob]

Does anyone here know if law schools give jack about what classes you take as far as their influence on admission? Will being a cell-bio major hurt me if I apply as a "failed pre-health"? I know that there are no pre-reqs but classes like political science and accounting are recommended.

Dude you are really really overthinking this, on a nuclear level. You are 2 weeks out of high school yet you are planning 10 steps ahead.
From a psychological standpoint, you are trying to control your future as a measure of security. But you have to understand that this is nothing more than an illusion. It's a false sense of control. The road your future takes has so many permutations, you cannot even begin to fathom. Believing that you know what will happen in 20 years at 18yo is a dream, and will not happen, especially when you are at such a crossroads. When I was 18 I had NO idea I would be where I am now (I was too busy chasing girls tbh).
Take your science prereqs and excel. Take the necessary courses for law as electives and excel. Take the DAT and LSAT. Make your decisions then. Trying to map out every step of your life right now is nothing more than a huge waste of time. You're much better off if you go out and chase some girls and have a good time, as long as you do well in school (I am being sincere).

 

[wengerout]

Does anyone here know if law schools give jack about what classes you take as far as their influence on admission? Will being a cell-bio major hurt me if I apply as a "failed pre-health"? I know that there are no pre-reqs but classes like political science and accounting are recommended.

If you know you want to be a Lawyer and just a Lawyer just major in something that you enjoy and will yield a high GPA, rock the LSAT, and do what it takes to get into a top 10 law school. It seems you'll be much happier that way and make just as much as the average dentist would if not more.


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