Looking at money in medicine .. for pre meds

[anbuitachi]

I've had way too many discussions about this and way too many (vast majority) of pre meds (even med students/residents often have no clue) have no idea what they are talking about (in real life and here). I decided to start a thread to help you pre meds understand the money in medicine a bit better.

To keep it short, here are the take away points for MDs (I dont know DO's situation)

1) Doctors make good annual salary. But it is only ONE number. To determine financial health, or to compare financial health, you need a lot more than 1 number. A college student making 250k at age 22, is not the same as a doctor making 250k at age 33. The difference is MUCH MUCH larger than you think.

2) The cost to become a doctor is massive. More than you think. Because theres lost wages, and compounding on interests

3) It takes a lot to become a doctor, even if you might not agree. To become an attending, you wouldve already gone thru MANY selection processes. Many of you were top students in HS to get into good college, then excel in college, then do well on MCAT, get into MD, be smart/diligent enough to graduate and pass exams, get into residency/specialty of choice, +/- get into fellowship, then FINALLY find a job. Too many of you see a starting salary of 250k, then compare it to starting salaries in other fields. It's NOT comparable. At every step of the way, people get weeded out. Becoming an attending is perhaps comparable to someone getting promoted multiple times at another job so comparing our starting salary to an entry level salary is ******ed.

4) if you can make it all the way thru residency/fellowship, and become an attending making 250k. You are probably smart enough to do OK in other fields too. You probably wont be that person getting fired from a company cause you suck.

5) Your salary as a doctor will depend heavily on insurance reimbursement rates, which for sure wont be making large increases out of no where, but can have large decreases out of no where. Therefore, you wont be getting significant raises even after years of practice unless you increase your volume/hours worked. This differs from most other fields in that they reward you for your experiences which result in significant raises.

6) Where you want to live matters. Living in NYC will be a lower salary than middle of no where. For most other high paying fields, large city wages are higher to adjust for cost of living. Not true for medicine.


Not knowing this stuff will leave you very disappointed in the future if you care about $$$.

Also, every field is changing quickly. Medicine is not static. Asking your parents or some old attending about how much they liked the finances of medicine is not comparable to the current situation (yes the current may not apply to the future as well but it's more likely than the past). Those physicians lived in an era of very different purchasing power. Their salary went a long way. Plus no 250k debt dragging them down.

My advice to pre meds who care about $$. Consider it from all angles, not just a annual #, cause that # only tells a very small part of the story.

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[anbuitachi]

Each applicant is different and you need to know where you stand. How is your gpa, your test taking skills? Looking at med vs law for example, both GPA and MCAT/LSAT scores are very important. Both make good money. But if you really want money how different are the two fields.

There are about 20000 med students every year, which is equivalent to the number of spots in the top 100 law schools. If you dont think you can get into a good law school, chances are your chances are better in medicine. But how hard is it to get into a good law school vs med school?

Looking at data from 2019:

The number of spots is 4310 for the top 14 schools. Which is equivalent to the spots in about the top 30 medical schools. I know a lot of you guys can achieve a GPA of 3.77 in good colleges, so if you can get into a top 30 medical school, you probably have a decent shot at getting into Top 14 law school. About 56% of them go to Biglaw firms (not that the salaries are low in other law firms, but obviously biglaw makes the most). But this # is probably underestimate since some people don't want to go to biglaw firms. Also this 56% only refers to new grads who go straight to big law.

How much do big law firms pay? Most of them pay comparable salaries.
Base:

Bonus:

To compare the finances, assuming you became a specialist making average of 300s.:

This doesn't even include interest on loans, and compounding gained in investments. Taking those into account would create an even LARGER difference. As you can see , the biglaw lawyer has made 1.63M more pre tax in 13 years after college vs specialist.

The key is to know yourself, know your value, your potential, and calculate from there! Obviously if you have a 3.3 gpa, it's probably safer to go medicine. If you are a rock star academically, looking to make $, medicine is not for you.

 

[anbuitachi]

If you understand the concepts, you can easily figure out how much doctors get paid vs other fields if you do research on the other fields. If you go to a good college with a good CS program and you dont absolutely hate coding, look into it. There are a lot of very smart people here on this forum from top schools who are much smarter than i am. I can tell you my finance friends in banks who started working right after college are making around what i make as an attending. (their base might be lower, but their bonus is 6 figures). The difference is they didn't pay 240k tuition, and instead have been getting paid for those years. The 8 years it took me to get to an attending, was enough time for them to get raises/promotions. And their salary will only go up (unless the market crashes then its hard to predict. But hey if we get medicare for all, we are screwed too).

It's even more obvious in tech. A lot of you go to top schools, and will have a lot of tech friends. Salaries in large tech companies are astronomical. My coding friends started working at age 22, making 150k total. 8 years later, when i got my first real job, many of them are already making 400k++. Levels.fyi - Compare career levels across companies is a useful website if you are curious. A mid level coder (takes about 5-10 years to get there which is comparable to your med school + residency), in large companies like dropbox/uber/amazon/msft/google/apple etc will make ~400-600k per year, with a better schedule/benefits too

But again this is from my perspective of having graduated from a top 20 school. Your experiences may vary. The purpose of these posts is to expand your horizons

 

[FISTMCLARGEHUGE]

I think the reality for the majority of people is medicine pays well and it pays enough you're likely not going to worry about cash compared to many other prospects. You're definitely right that there are more lucrative careers if you want to maximize income. A lot of comparisons people make to other fields imply you're an engineer or coding at google which is a very small population. This arguments also imply that you're only taking home salary and not putting money into anything else which can have massive positive or negative impacts on net worth.

When leaving my previous job to start this process I was offered a position that paid more than I'll likely make as an attending at any point (granted it had some other occupational hazards I wont encounter in a hospital). I looked the next 40 or so years between the two options and found that unless the lifestyle I want changes drastically or I get tricked into having 5 kids I'm way past the threshold for comfortable either way.

I think it's good you're putting cash into perspective for this generally younger group but I also think it needs to be established that comparing specialists pay vs harvard law grad pay is an argument taking place way past the general line of wealthy. Also if I was a lawyer I would 100% suck start a 12 gauge within a decade, so that's a consideration with life style.

 

[Kardio]

I’m not trying to be a preacher here, but I think “don’t do medicine for the money” is common knowledge. If you want to be part of the 99.9%, this isn’t the best route to go.

Maybe this breakdown is helpful for some people, but I always figured folks in Big Law, Business, High Finance or Tech will often out-earn me. Some by gigantic margins. In exchange, I’ll get high job security, an upper-middle class lifestyle, and be a member of the most respected profession on the planet (not to mention doing some extremely fulfilling work).

 

[deleted746658]

just wait until you are a newly minted resident and your non-med peers are crushing it. i was naive... that's why i ended up in medicine. for most of us competitive and smart enough to make it into the sinking ship that is medicine, i bet the vast majority of us could find a relatively good paying job w/ much less stress and hours... and if you are frugal and invest wisely, you can live a pretty sweet life.

medicine is on the decline. that is a fact. we will never earn as much as older docs did and yet tuition keeps rising. tech, business, sales, marketing, etc. take a strong, strong look at these and ensure you couldn't do any before turning to medicine. pls. i'm still 5 years out from my big pay day, and lemme tell u, that 6 figure loan GROWS VERY VERY FAST and you can't do a damn thing about it as a resident.

 

[anbuitachi]

I’m not trying to be a preacher here, but I think “don’t do medicine for the money” is common knowledge. If you want to be part of the 99.9%, this isn’t the best route to go.

Maybe this breakdown is helpful for some people, but I always figured folks in Big Law, Business, High Finance or Tech will often out-earn me. Some by gigantic margins. In exchange, I’ll get high job security, an upper-middle class lifestyle, and be a member of the most respected profession on the planet (not to mention doing some extremely fulfilling work).

Agree with you. but its much easier to believe 'dont do medicine for the money' if you understand where its coming from. too many pre meds are told 'dont do it for money' but they dont know why, and they see the 300k pay and they think why not, and do it anyway. ive met so many med students/residents who understand later on why it is and regret it. not saying do medicine just for the money but for a lot of people who have many interests, that 300k # may sway ppl to a side. i can tell you when i was pre med, i certainly didn't consider the power of compounding, lost wages, tuition cost etc. i was just a dumb undergrad.

also i think the high security job is becoming more of a thing of the past. again if we are comparing to avg americans going into XYZ field, sure, but if we are comparing equally smart individuals in other fields (finance/tech), how many become unemployed and stay so? There are SOOO many companies out there in finance/law/tech. Dont forget that those who become attendings have already survived the weed so it's not a fair comparison to compare their entire field with ours

Also in some specialties, the jobs are not as stable as pre meds think anymore. many hospitals are closing or have closed in the past decade, groups bought out by large employers/companies, healthcare changes and the future is still pretty unpredictable right now with so many politicians aiming for medicare for all. its very unlikely to be unemployed, but its not that unlikely to be forced to change employers

 

[anbuitachi]

I think the reality for the majority of people is medicine pays well and it pays enough you're likely not going to worry about cash compared to many other prospects. You're definitely right that there are more lucrative careers if you want to maximize income. A lot of comparisons people make to other fields imply you're an engineer or coding at google which is a very small population. This arguments also imply that you're only taking home salary and not putting money into anything else which can have massive positive or negative impacts on net worth.

When leaving my previous job to start this process I was offered a position that paid more than I'll likely make as an attending at any point (granted it had some other occupational hazards I wont encounter in a hospital). I looked the next 40 or so years between the two options and found that unless the lifestyle I want changes drastically or I get tricked into having 5 kids I'm way past the threshold for comfortable either way.

I think it's good you're putting cash into perspective for this generally younger group but I also think it needs to be established that comparing specialists pay vs harvard law grad pay is an argument taking place way past the general line of wealthy. Also if I was a lawyer I would 100% suck start a 12 gauge within a decade, so that's a consideration with life style.

I get what you are saying, but one point i wanted to make is that there are a LOT of smart people in medicine (just look at the avg GPA of med schools these days). Many of you will think working in a good tech company is difficult and probably out of reach, thats not true. Sure not everyone will get in, and that's why i said this has to be individualized. Also, pre meds need to realize that it's a lot more than just the Google of tech paying that types of salaries!. Same with big laws. I posted the data because it's NOT the harvard law grads. Like i said its 56% of top 14 law schools (which is equivalent to top 30 med school in terms of # of grads). And that's ignoring other high paying law jobs.

Again if your stats land you in the bottom half of med, statistically you are probably better off doing medicine if you had to choose between law/tech/finance vs medicine.

Again im only focusing on finance. Im not taking into account your interests since this thread isn't about should i go into medicine or not

 

[Kardio]

Agree with you. but its much easier to believe 'dont do medicine for the money' if you understand where its coming from. too many pre meds are told 'dont do it for money' but they dont know why, and they see the 300k pay and they think why not, and do it anyway. ive met so many med students/residents who understand later on why it is and regret it. not saying do medicine just for the money but for a lot of people who have many interests, that 300k # may sway ppl to a side. i can tell you when i was pre med, i certainly didn't consider the power of compounding, lost wages, tuition cost etc. i was just a dumb undergrad.

Fair enough

also i think the high security job is becoming more of a thing of the past. again if we are comparing to avg americans going into XYZ field, sure, but if we are comparing equally smart individuals in other fields (finance/tech), how many become unemployed and stay so? There are SOOO many companies out there in finance/law/tech. Dont forget that those who become attendings have already survived the weed so it's not a fair comparison to compare their entire field with ours

I don’t have numbers to back this up, but I’m going to shoot from the hip and disagree with you anyway. We’re in a decades long bull market. Economic times are great right now. When the S&P plummets 15-20%, as it inevitably will at some point in the next century, I don’t see the physician workforce being cut as much as any other sector we’re talking about.

I think that if we were in 2008, you would have a different perspective on the financial value of being a physician compared to other professions.

Also in some specialties, the jobs are not as stable as pre meds think anymore. many hospitals are closing or have closed in the past decade, groups bought out by large employers/companies, healthcare changes and the future is still pretty unpredictable right now with so many politicians aiming for medicare for all. its very unlikely to be unemployed, but its not that unlikely to be forced to change employers

OK - agreed that the future is unpredictable. In my opinion, that’s a poor reason to avoid medicine.

In every career I’ve ever been interested in, I’ve been told by veterans of said career that “this job isn’t wasnt it used to be” or “you should become an xyz instead.” They see other options with rose tinted glasses; I think this is a human universal.

 

[PA_dud3]

What's with all the salary threads lately?

 

[anbuitachi]

What's with all the salary threads lately?

It's in part why i created this thread =)

 

[Engrailed]

What's with all the salary threads lately?

I was just going to post the same thing.
This is quite sad.

 

[anbuitachi]

I think that if we were in 2008, you would have a different perspective on the financial value of being a physician compared to other professions.

OK - agreed that the future is unpredictable. In my opinion, that’s a poor reason to avoid medicine.

In every career I’ve ever been interested in, I’ve been told by veterans of said career that “this job isn’t wasnt it used to be” or “you should become an xyz instead.” They see other options with rose tinted glasses; I think this is a human universal.

I agree with you in some parts. I dont think you'll ever not have jobs for physicians. As a society we NEED physicians because we provide an invaluable service. What will change with economy is physician reimbursement. We will always live thru ups and downs in economy. Finance took a hit in 2008, but its back stronger than ever. Its again important to remember that to become attendings you already survived thru a lot of weed off process. The people like you are probably not the ones to get fired and stay unemployed. Most peoples bonus will go down of course

 

[anbuitachi]

I was just going to post the same thing.
This is quite sad.

To be fair, its an important topic whether like it or not. Burnout/mental health issues in physicians is a significant problem and salary/work life balance is a contributor.

 

[FISTMCLARGEHUGE]

I get what you are saying, but one point i wanted to make is that there are a LOT of smart people in medicine (just look at the avg GPA of med schools these days). Many of you will think working in a good tech company is difficult and probably out of reach, thats not true. Sure not everyone will get in, and that's why i said this has to be individualized. Also, pre meds need to realize that it's a lot more than just the Google of tech paying that types of salaries!. Same with big laws. I posted the data because it's NOT the harvard law grads. Like i said its 56% of top 14 law schools (which is equivalent to top 30 med school in terms of # of grads). And that's ignoring other high paying law jobs.

Again if your stats land you in the bottom half of med, statistically you are probably better off doing medicine if you had to choose between law/tech/finance vs medicine.

Again im only focusing on finance. Im not taking into account your interests since this thread isn't about should i go into medicine or not

One thing worth noting is getting into medschool is a well establish flowchart and list of check boxes. The entire process has been dissected to the point that there are hundreds of books and an entire industry based on just admissions. This process doesn't require much thought. I would argue that competency in this doesn't mean that you're competent enough to succeed anywhere. This is an incredibly safe path. Something uncommon in many other fields and has likely pushed more people along than they realize. I'd also be interested to see how the GPA comparison holds up between similar majors. Just playing devil's advocate/not culturing egos. I also think a post like this are good to save some people a lot of headaches if money is a motivator and open spots for those who aren't applying for that reason.

 

[DNAJB6]

Each applicant is different and you need to know where you stand. How is your gpa, your test taking skills? Looking at med vs law for example, both GPA and MCAT/LSAT scores are very important. Both make good money. But if you really want money how different are the two fields.

Law school is an awful option financially. If you don't go to a top 5 school or so entire career options are off the top. The job market is abysmal even for some top school grads. I know of a Columbia Law School grad that ended up teaching Kaplan LSAT courses, and he didn't bomb law school. Many newly minted JDs have problems finding jobs, and those that do often don't make that much. I know of multiple attorneys with six figures of debt that make less than $70k a year. Big law salaries are going down, more associates are being laid off, and a number of larger firms have filed for bankruptcy that had been run successfully for decades. Oh big law firm jobs are hell - like IM/general surgery medical residency but without the happy ending.

 

[clinicallabguy]

I think undergrads should consider multiple possible careers and go see what they actually look like. I would avoid believing what physicians tell you about what it's like to be a lawyer, and vice versa. If you ask a non-physician about their physician acquaintances, I'm sure you'll hear a biased assessment that will include reports of long vacations to exotic places, large houses, nice cars, etc. The pound of flesh required to make it in any field is often hidden from view from people not in that field. That is true of medicine, so I imagine it is true of other fields.

I see the idea posted on SDN ad nauseam that if you have the GPA and extra-curricular activities to get into medical school that you can assume that you will be successful in other high income fields. I don't know that it's always a false claim, but I'm not sure that it's 100% true in all cases. The road to medical school and through medical training is arduous and taxing, but it is already paved. It requires little to no creativity in planning your own career, because you just go through the pre-determined pipeline. Success in other fields may need a little more creative planning and self development. The path to success may be more winding and challenging in different ways which favor people with different skills. Self reflection is a better way to discover what career will lead to success than calculating the highest career earnings and going for that with no more thought what came out of the spreadsheet.

I'm at the end of my training this year so I'm in about the worse financial shape that I likely will be for the rest of my life. I've got more than a quarter million dollars of debt, I'm providing for a small family, and I'm driving a dented Nissan with faded paint that I've replaced the clutch on several times, and it's starting to stick again (ARGGH!). But I love what I do. And I know that financially things will only get better from here. I've learned through residency to live on less than I make, and if I continue to do that as an attending I anticipate I'll by financially independent within 15 years or less after starting as an attending if I stick to my plan. So I don't regret my decision.

One frustrating thing I have to admit about the decision to pursue medicine is that you make a decision based on what the field looks like (for me in 2008, before anybody ever uttered the words "Affordable Care Act") and then you get out on the other side 7-10 years later with something that may look completely different. You have to decide for yourself whether you're willing to go down that rabbit hole and find out whether you'll end up at a tea party or whether the queen cuts off your head.

 

[anbuitachi]

Law school is an awful option financially. If you don't go to a top 5 school or so entire career options are off the top. The job market is abysmal even for some top school grads. I know of a Columbia Law School grad that ended up teaching Kaplan LSAT courses, and he didn't bomb law school. Many newly minted JDs have problems finding jobs, and those that do often don't make that much. I know of multiple attorneys with six figures of debt that make less than $70k a year. Big law salaries are going down, more associates are being laid off, and a number of larger firms have filed for bankruptcy that had been run successfully for decades. Oh big law firm jobs are hell - like IM/general surgery medical residency but without the happy ending.

This is just false. Unless you can back it up. I gave you some data of recent biglaw numbers in top 14 schools which is equivalent to top 30 med schools. Salary at biglaw went up not down. Again back up your statements otherwise it's just nonsense.

And you just ignored most of what I was saying in my post. Of course there'll be lawyers with bad job and lot of debt. Did you read my post. To become an attending you go thru more hurdles than to become an lawyer. Of course you'll see way more people with bad jobs for lawyer than medicine. There are twice as many law grads than med every year

The point isn't to get ppl to go to law school for money. It was just an example comparing two fields. You can find 100 things to disagree with personally because it's not tailored for each individual

Law School Rankings by Median Salary

www.ilrg.com

Here is the median salary of law grads. If you go into a private firm (not government or public) your median salary for first year working lawyer is 180k for the top 23 law schools. That's just starting.

 

[PieOHmy]

All you have to know is the following:

Physician salary today Primary care 237K specialists 341

A regular old recovery room nurse with a 2 year degree makes 87k and thats no overtime.

SO a pcp is barely making over 3x a pacu nurse.

Having read what the OP has just pointed out, what is the better route?

 

[anbuitachi]

I think undergrads should consider multiple possible careers and go see what they actually look like. I would avoid believing what physicians tell you about what it's like to be a lawyer, and vice versa. If you ask a non-physician about their physician acquaintances, I'm sure you'll hear a biased assessment that will include reports of long vacations to exotic places, large houses, nice cars, etc. The pound of flesh required to make it in any field is often hidden from view from people not in that field. That is true of medicine, so I imagine it is true of other fields.

I see the idea posted on SDN ad nauseam that if you have the GPA and extra-curricular activities to get into medical school that you can assume that you will be successful in other high income fields. I don't know that it's always a false claim, but I'm not sure that it's 100% true in all cases. The road to medical school and through medical training is arduous and taxing, but it is already paved. It requires little to no creativity in planning your own career, because you just go through the pre-determined pipeline. Success in other fields may need a little more creative planning and self development. The path to success may be more winding and challenging in different ways which favor people with different skills. Self reflection is a better way to discover what career will lead to success than calculating the highest career earnings and going for that with no more thought what came out of the spreadsheet.

I'm at the end of my training this year so I'm in about the worse financial shape that I likely will be for the rest of my life. I've got more than a quarter million dollars of debt, I'm providing for a small family, and I'm driving a dented Nissan with faded paint that I've replaced the clutch on several times, and it's starting to stick again (ARGGH!). But I love what I do. And I know that financially things will only get better from here. I've learned through residency to live on less than I make, and if I continue to do that as an attending I anticipate I'll by financially independent within 15 years or less after starting as an attending if I stick to my plan. So I don't regret my decision.

One frustrating thing I have to admit about the decision to pursue medicine is that you make a decision based on what the field looks like (for me in 2008, before anybody ever uttered the words "Affordable Care Act") and then you get out on the other side 7-10 years later with something that may look completely different. You have to decide for yourself whether you're willing to go down that rabbit hole and find out whether you'll end up at a tea party or whether the queen cuts off your head.

I agree with a lot of what you are saying but the purpose of my thread like I mentioned in my post is to help pre med understand some of the finances behind medicine and how to more accurately interpret that 300k number . It's not really about should I go to medicine or not. I know there are tons of factors in that and salary is just one. Same for law. I'm not saying law is a better field for pre meds and I'm not saying their life is great or anything. I'm just talking about numbers and how to look at it.

With what you said about being successful in other jobs. Nothing is 100 percent. Most of medicine as you know is statistics, risk vs benefit, percent of success vs failure, etc. I'm not saying you'll succeed in other field or even in medicine. Nothing is a sure thing. But if you are a smart person, medicine probably isn't the only field you can succeed in.

A lot of the weed out process tests your qualities and character not just how smart you are. Can you work crazy hours and survive, can you put in the effort etc. The many tests tests your brain power. If you work crazy hours in another field like you do in medicine you'll probably do just fine in another field.

 

[PieOHmy]

. If you work crazy hours in another field like you do in medicine you'll probably do just fine in another field.

That is exactly right. If you pt in 1/2 the amount of effort into something else.. anything.. working at burger king,... walmart.. amazon... etc etc.. My guess you will be a freakin owner before too long..
People simply dont understand the sacrifices and the work and the talent necessary to become a good physician.

They will find out though!

 

[clinicallabguy]

I agree with a lot of what you are saying but the purpose of my thread like I mentioned in my post is to help pre med understand some of the finances behind medicine and how to more accurately interpret that 300k number . It's not really about should I go to medicine or not. I know there are tons of factors in that and salary is just one. Same for law. I'm not saying law is a better field for pre meds and I'm not saying their life is great or anything. I'm just talking about numbers and how to look at it.

With what you said about being successful in other jobs. Nothing is 100 percent. Most of medicine as you know is statistics, risk vs benefit, percent of success vs failure, etc. I'm not saying you'll succeed in other field or even in medicine. Nothing is a sure thing. But if you are a smart person, medicine probably isn't the only field you can succeed in.

A lot of the weed out process tests your qualities and character not just how smart you are. Can you work crazy hours and survive, can you put in the effort etc. The many tests tests your brain power. If you work crazy hours in another field like you do in medicine you'll probably do just fine in another field.

Sure. I agree with that. And the point about career earnings versus annual salary is definitely a good one. I wish the tax code reflected more understanding of that as well.

 

[tri99]

As a career changer from a management/finance background, the difference is ALL physicians make $200,000+. Believe me, just because you can pull a 4.0 GPA doesn't mean you will be a successful businessman/businesswoman, and it surely doesn't ensure you will be compensated well. Most business professionals enter the work-force making $30k-$60k and promotions are rarely based on merit alone.

Yes, it is very important to take into consideration the opportunity cost of medical education for the sake of your own finances, but you can't put a price on meaningful work. Would you rather spend your 20's-30's learning the intricacies of the human body and how to utilize that knowledge to improve the lives of others, or cold-calling 150+ people a day pushing some product you don't give a damn about?

 

[anbuitachi]

As a career changer from a management/finance background, the difference is ALL physicians make $200,000+. Believe me, just because you can pull a 4.0 GPA doesn't mean you will be a successful businessman/businesswoman, and it surely doesn't ensure you will be compensated well. Most business professionals enter the work-force making $30k-$60k and promotions are rarely based on merit alone.

Yes, it is very important to take into consideration the opportunity cost of medical education for the sake of your own finances, but you can't put a price on meaningful work. Would you rather spend your 20's-30's learning the intricacies of the human body and how to utilize that knowledge to improve the lives of others, or cold-calling 150+ people a day pushing some product you don't give a damn about?

You have a 4.0. Assuming you didn't go to an awful college or majored in dance and still decided to go into business, why are you cold calling 150+ ppl pushing them to buy your product? That's a job i can find on craigslist when i was in high school.

 

[tri99]

You have a 4.0. Assuming you didn't go to an awful college or majored in dance and still decided to go into business, why are you cold calling 150+ ppl pushing them to buy your product? That's a job i can find on craigslist when i was in high school.

Because when you enter the field of management / administration your GPA is irrelevant compared to relative work experience. And larger companies know your 2 “summer internships” were nothing more than filing papers or cold calling, so they start you in the same position until you have 2 years experience in the field. This was the result for myself and my peers after graduating from a top 20 management program.

Physicians are obviously extraordinarily intelligent, but the notion that any physician could walk into a big time bank and become a regional branch manager within 5-10 years is foolish.

 

[beattheprocess]

Law and business are just so meh to me.

 

[deleted846074]

I often see this naive mindset that if you can make it into medical school, you're basically a god and can outwork and excel past other people in different fields. This could not be further from the truth. The skills required to get into medical schools are vastly different from running a successful business or being a lawyer/tech person.

My friend out of one of the best engineering schools in the country got a great paying job out of college at a tech company. Worked upwards of 90 hours and was just laid off the past week after going hard for 6 months. Just because you grind hard in a job doesn't mean you will make it anywhere. It is entirely dependent on profit for whatever company you work for. You are expendable. Period.

Another friend I actually went to school with went into IB on the west coast and was working 80 hour weeks and just quit his job after his 2 year contract because it was literally just looking at numbers and money, no other fulfilling aspect.

I ran a business myself and it tanked because I was naive enough to think that since I'm great at science I should be able to work out this business stuff, it's not hard right? (wrong). Studying business and taking exams over stuff is easier than a science course, but actually conducting business is difficult.

How many physicians deal with just randomly getting laid off? If you go through medical school, residency, fellowship, and land a job, you will undoubtedly be able to land a salary that is higher than most of your friends from college barring any outliers who struck gold. You might still be wondering, "Well all those others have 10+ years of making an income". Who says that they actually even saved any of that income in the first place those first 10 years of working? Who actually shares their personal finance records truthfully with anyone? They could be overextended and in debt because they finally got into money after college or just saved 10-15 thousand a year.

At the end of the day, no matter which professional you ask, they are going to point at some other field and say, "man that person has it so much better because of xyz". The personal finance skills of an individual matter the most. I personally know of households who bring in 200k+ a year and always miss payments due to being overextended with so many obligations.

You're never going to be completely satisfied with anything, the pros just have to outweigh the cons for you.

 

[deleted976595]

I often see this naive mindset that if you can make it into medical school, you're basically a god and can outwork and excel past other people in different fields. This could not be further from the truth. The skills required to get into medical schools are vastly different from running a successful business or being a lawyer/tech person.

My friend out of one of the best engineering schools in the country got a great paying job out of college at a tech company. Worked upwards of 90 hours and was just laid off the past week after going hard for 6 months. Just because you grind hard in a job doesn't mean you will make it anywhere. It is entirely dependent on profit for whatever company you work for. You are expendable. Period.

Another friend I actually went to school with went into IB on the west coast and was working 80 hour weeks and just quit his job after his 2 year contract because it was literally just looking at numbers and money, no other fulfilling aspect.

I ran a business myself and it tanked because I was naive enough to think that since I'm great at science I should be able to work out this business stuff, it's not hard right? (wrong). Studying business and taking exams over stuff is easier than a science course, but actually conducting business is difficult.

How many physicians deal with just randomly getting laid off? If you go through medical school, residency, fellowship, and land a job, you will undoubtedly be able to land a salary that is higher than most of your friends from college barring any outliers who struck gold. You might still be wondering, "Well all those others have 10+ years of making an income". Who says that they actually even saved any of that income in the first place those first 10 years of working? Who actually shares their personal finance records truthfully with anyone? They could be overextended and in debt because they finally got into money after college or just saved 10-15 thousand a year.

At the end of the day, no matter which professional you ask, they are going to point at some other field and say, "man that person has it so much better because of xyz". The personal finance skills of an individual matter the most. I personally know of households who bring in 200k+ a year and always miss payments due to being overextended with so many obligations.

You're never going to be completely satisfied with anything, the pros just have to outweigh the cons for you.

Agreed. People love to act like those who go into business/tech/whatever and end up making 150-200k+ work 40 hour weeks. More often than not these jobs require just as heavy a time investment as an attending position without nearly as much job security.

 

[clinicallabguy]

Agreed. People love to act like those who go into business/tech/whatever and end up making 150-200k+ work 40 hour weeks. More often than not these jobs require just as heavy a time investment as an attending position without nearly as much job security.

No no. But I figured it out. Here's what you do:

Step 1: Study really hard, do all the pre-medical stuff
Step 2: Get into medical school

Step 3: You can do whatever you want. There is literally no one more talented, attractive, intelligent, or better at posting on anonymous internet forums than you!

Step 4: Quit medical school and go become a ROCK AND ROLL GOD in just 2 years! It's probably better than clinical rotations, and you can be a better than those music majors because, you know, you took the MCAT.

 

[FISTMCLARGEHUGE]

No no. But I figured it out. Here's what you do:

Step 1: Study really hard, do all the pre-medical stuff
Step 2: Get into medical school

Step 3: You can do whatever you want. There is literally no one more talented, attractive, intelligent, or better at posting on anonymous internet forums than you!

Step 4: Quit medical school and go become a ROCK AND ROLL GOD in just 2 years! It's probably better than clinical rotations, and you can be a better than those music majors because, you know, you took the MCAT.

I'll have you know as soon as I passed Ochem my third eye opened and I founded Spotify. I'm astounded these top law and investment firms are taking business school graduates that haven't even had to take biochem or mindlessly memorized facts for the MCAT like me. Volunteering and doing research taught me to get 40 hours out of every 24 and I'm technically 35 instead of 27 because of it.

 

[RangerBob]

As mentioned above, most law grads are in miserable conditions. There have been numerous articles from papers like the NYT discussing this. Grads from anything other than top schools rarely make six figures and a huge percentage are working jobs that don’t require a JD. All with debt that isn’t that much lower than an MD’s.

Those making big salaries at top firms have miserable work-life balance. Think residency, but for your entire life.

Coders/tech may make good money-generally if you’re in Silicon Valley, where a “decent” home will cost you over $1 million (and often run closer to 2). My childhood home (an average home) is worth almost $2 million now. In the Midwest, it’d be $250,000 or so. Tech people are often limited to where they can live-remote work is typically for those who have been with the company a long time.

Finance? Most don’t make what we think they do. Entirely dependent on how the market is doing. Terrible work-life balance if you’re making big money.

None of those jobs are even close to “recession-proof” like being an RN or MD is. It is actually scary how bad of a doctor you can be and still find a good-paying job somewhere. Try talking to some of your friends’ parents who lost their jobs in the great-recession. Many were bright people, at the top of their fields, and very dedicated. They were going to job fairs to take any job that would hire them.

MDs are guaranteed a great salary (hoe many fields can say that?). We have amongst the best job stability of any field. We are needed, and wanted. The public respects us. When you’re an attending, you can be your own boss and set your own hours, and still make good money.

I cannot think of any other field that offers what medicine can. Firefighting? Almost, but there all all the on-the-job hazard. Great pay, great pension and early retirement. Everyone loves them too. Probably make more over their lifetime than I will...

 

[southcalcardiology]

Well I know that I’m using my signing bonus on the down payment for an 720s.

 

[Select All That Apply]

You have a 4.0. Assuming you didn't go to an awful college or majored in dance and still decided to go into business, why are you cold calling 150+ ppl pushing them to buy your product? That's a job i can find on craigslist when i was in high school.

You are cold calling 150+ people because you are a new grad/intern in an initial class of 30 to 60 people to Goldman Sachs, all with 4.0's and from prestigious colleges. You haven't taken a Series 7 exam, you have no clout, and you would be laughed & then kicked out if you demanded to handle an established client. You are nothing and nobody. Without a doubt this class will be reduced to single digits before they decide on a top 5 list of candidates to actually hire. So if they tell you to hit up all your contacts and their list of prospective buyers who have dog **** FICO scores in order to push the Apple Card on them, you do it because your stay at Goldman is tenuous and being selected to cold call those 150+ people is a privilege that your peers would die to have. The same goes for being an intern at a BigLaw firm doing case review and summary notes. It's not intellectually stimulating nor fun in the sense that doing logic puzzles on the LSAT could have been. You are parsing through legalese in order to find a hole or an interpretation to a previous law that could have legs to stand on when it comes to a litigation case to the client you are defending. It's the epitome of frontal lobe scut work and it's more degrading than the scut work involved in medicine.

 

[southcalcardiology]

Junior analysts at Goldman just live in the office and order seamless web (which I didn’t even know was still a thing with ubereats etc)

 

[Select All That Apply]

Junior analysts at Goldman just live in the office and order seamless web (which I didn’t even know was still a thing with ubereats etc)

Thank god Seamless/Uber Eats is now a thing... otherwise...

Junior analysts at Goldman just live in the office...

 

[Select All That Apply]

@anbuitachi You are completely off center with attempting to merge the law school situation with the nature of success and failure. It's okay. You weren't aware of the scam blog/ITLSS movement which made law school applicants aware that the legal education system was borderline fraudulent. You're not aware of how schools gamifyied post-employment data 9 months post-graduation by giving minimum wage fake jobs to their legal grads so they would report employment on the ABA's exit survey metrics (then they were let go to enable them to "transition" to their next "legal" job). You also didn't likely know about how schools were misappropriating students who were working at K-mart or Walmart post graduation as being in a position that was considered JD advantage e.g. they couldn't have gotten this job without a JD. Nor did you know about the blatant cases of schools misreporting their data and there being no second check as the ABA was presenting their employment statistics from what information schools were feeding them. How about the judge ruling that all these instances fell under the concept of caveat emptor establishing a legal precedent that basically gave law schools free reign to continue this behavior with little to no oversight?

19 months and 499 posts later, it turns out that the core message of this blog – that legal academia is operating on the basis of an unsustainable economic model, which requires most law students to borrow more money to get law degrees than it makes sense for them to borrow, given their career prospects, and that for many years law schools worked hard, wittingly or unwittingly, to hide this increasingly inconvenient truth from both themselves and their potential matriculants – has evolved from a horrible heresy to something close to conventional wisdom.

- Paul Campos - Professor of Law - University of Colorado Law School

 

[anbuitachi]

Most of you above are missing the point, and looking at the small stuff.

Not going to bother responding to each one individually, because thats just not worth my time. The reason i made this thread was to help pre meds analyze the financial situation of medicine. The law post was simply an example of how you may go about doing it.

If you can't understand that, thats fine. You'll probably go into medicine anyway and best of luck to you.

I'm not trying to convince people to apply to law, or whatever, or leave medicine.

And also no where in my post said you will succeed in whatever you go into. I said multiple times that this needs to be individualized. We all know people who did in great in college, and didnt do well after, in whatever field, law, engineering, business, or whatever. That is not the piont.

I didn't think i have to say this but apparently it's not obvious to some people. Just cause you have a 4.0 and becoming an attending one day, doesn't mean if you start a startup, you'll succeed. It doesn't mean you'll take over a bank, or come up with the next great new innovation. All it means is you are more LIKELY to succeed in ANOTHER field as well. Because medical school tests your ability to work hard, put in effort, and be smart, qualifies that are important to many jobs out there.

We all have friends who didn't get promoted, or got fired or whatever. So what? How many people drop out of pre med because its too difficult or dont have the grades? Plenty. Then out of those who apply, how many dont get in, and out of those who get in, how many dont get into the school you were hoping for, and later on the residency you are hoping for? If you only look at the attendings, you DONT think about those who FAIL to become an attending. That's pretty much equivalent to getting fired/not promoted in other jobs. Yet again for some reason, we compare attendings to entry level positions in another field. Pretty sad stuff

 

[anbuitachi]

@anbuitachi You are completely off center with attempting to merge the law school situation with the nature of success and failure. It's okay. You weren't aware of the scam blog/ITLSS movement which made law school applicants aware that the legal education system was borderline fraudulent. You're not aware of how schools gamifyied post-employment data 9 months post-graduation by giving minimum wage fake jobs to their legal grads so they would report employment on the ABA's exit survey metrics (then they were let go to enable them to "transition" to their next "legal" job). You also didn't likely know about how schools were misappropriating students who were working at K-mart or Walmart post graduation as being in a position that was considered JD advantage e.g. they couldn't have gotten this job without a JD. Nor did you know about the blatant cases of schools misreporting their data and there being no second check as the ABA was presenting their employment statistics from what information schools were feeding them. How about the judge ruling that all these instances fell under the concept of caveat emptor establishing a legal precedent that basically gave law schools free reign to continue this behavior with little to no oversight?

- Paul Campos - Professor of Law - University of Colorado Law School

You completely missed the point of the post.

And off topic but are you really pre med? if so do you even know what industry you are attempting to get into... I laugh.

 

[Select All That Apply]

@anbuitachi If your response to me is that you're laughing at me, then I don't really have a constructive response. Especially when it seems like in this thread you have no capacity for acknowledging that some of your comments were out of touch with reality. I'm not responding to this thread anymore, have fun with feeling justified that you are being misinterpreted and misunderstood by a lot of people.

 

[anbuitachi]

@anbuitachi If your response to me is that you're laughing at me, then I don't really have a constructive response. Especially when it seems like in this thread you have no capacity for acknowledging that your comments were out of touch with reality.

You literally just ignored my post again and only focused on the last 2 words.

What was the piont of your post? That law school sucks, its corrupt, its a scam? So what? What do you think medicine/healthcare industry is? Not corrupt and filled with scams? Also What does that have to do my post? Did i say if you go to law school you'll be rich? No. The point is to get the concept presented in my 1st post across, that you need to look at money more than just the annual salary.

You literally posted something that has nothing to do with the purpose of this topic. I was just pointing that out to you. But it seems like you still dont get it

 

[Lawpy]

I think there is some good advice mentioned in the OP, but honestly, the resulting discussions usually end up being filled with misinformation and bias that I basically ignore finance discussions on SDN.

 

[907914]

I think there is some good advice mentioned in the OP, but honestly, the resulting discussions usually end up being filled with misinformation and bias that I basically ignore finance discussions on SDN.

I make all of my financial decisions based on word of mouth from strangers with little to no financial background. I suggest you do the same!

 

[mcat_taker]

All you have to know is the following:

Physician salary today Primary care 237K specialists 341

A regular old recovery room nurse with a 2 year degree makes 87k and thats no overtime.

SO a pcp is barely making over 3x a pacu nurse.

Having read what the OP has just pointed out, what is the better route?

How about the NP/PA making 120k working normal working hours and no call? and the PCP making 230k .

 

[mcat_taker]

As mentioned above, most law grads are in miserable conditions. There have been numerous articles from papers like the NYT discussing this. Grads from anything other than top schools rarely make six figures and a huge percentage are working jobs that don’t require a JD. All with debt that isn’t that much lower than an MD’s.

Those making big salaries at top firms have miserable work-life balance. Think residency, but for your entire life.

Coders/tech may make good money-generally if you’re in Silicon Valley, where a “decent” home will cost you over $1 million (and often run closer to 2). My childhood home (an average home) is worth almost $2 million now. In the Midwest, it’d be $250,000 or so. Tech people are often limited to where they can live-remote work is typically for those who have been with the company a long time.

Finance? Most don’t make what we think they do. Entirely dependent on how the market is doing. Terrible work-life balance if you’re making big money.

None of those jobs are even close to “recession-proof” like being an RN or MD is. It is actually scary how bad of a doctor you can be and still find a good-paying job somewhere. Try talking to some of your friends’ parents who lost their jobs in the great-recession. Many were bright people, at the top of their fields, and very dedicated. They were going to job fairs to take any job that would hire them.

MDs are guaranteed a great salary (hoe many fields can say that?). We have amongst the best job stability of any field. We are needed, and wanted. The public respects us. When you’re an attending, you can be your own boss and set your own hours, and still make good money.

I cannot think of any other field that offers what medicine can. Firefighting? Almost, but there all all the on-the-job hazard. Great pay, great pension and early retirement. Everyone loves them too. Probably make more over their lifetime than I will...

Set your own hours? Most of the attendings I know work the hours they need to work for FTE salary or they get replaced like a cog in the machine that is EVERY DOCTOR in every big healthcare system. That means weekend call, working holidays, phone calls to other teams in the afternoons, calling patient's family members, notes and more notes after hours, teaching residents, going deeper into the medical chart on a more challenging case that hasn't revealed an answer yet, the list goes on. Becoming an attending doesn't automatically make your life awesome. You finally get paid a decent wage after a a decade of school and training but don't think for a second you can just make your own decisions on when you can work. Even strictly outpatient you need to generate enough RVUs to justify them paying you. You need to maintain availability and a patient panel, etc.

Yes most high income professionals work a lot to justify what they are being paid. Being a doctor is no different or better and is certainly not a "lifestyle" career unless you do a certain select few elite specialities that are difficult to match into.

 

[MedRad1990]

There are so many BS talks here. Medicine is probably one of the most safest fields to earn good money nowadays in the US. Sure, CS/finance people make good money when they are young and get promoted when they gets older, but what you don’t see is the job is not secure. Technology evolves every 5-10 years, I am not talking about guideline changing treatment A to treatment B, I am talking about learning new coding system and new algorithm. If you don’t learn you either transition to administration or you get fired. Medicine requires CME, but I have never heard people unable to complete it. In finance, the single most important thing is safety of your capital. Say you make 300K a year, there is self-investment option A: 50% chance of making 600K in 10 years and 50% chance of making 100K in 10 years. Then investment option B: 99.9% chance of making 350K in 10 years. There are a lot of people who will choose plan B. Yes. Medicine will not easily get you a million dollar a year any more like what it used to be. But dude, we are talking about at least 6 folds higher salary then regular median income and on top of that you can easily stretch yourself out and make more. Most specialties have plenty of opportunities for you to make extra money. Technically, even a hospitalist can make up to half a million as long as you work crazy hours. So stop giving people false information, there is a reason the tuition keeps going up because all the spots are still filled. Even If you charge 200K a year there will still be plenty of students who will do it. Because job safety+good salary= best job in the world.

 

[Ludwig2000]

Junior analysts at Goldman just live in the office and order seamless web (which I didn’t even know was still a thing with ubereats etc)

Seamless = GrubHub; they only still call it “Seamless” in NYC. I know this because I’m a high powered elite (no brag)

 

[deleted746658]

There are so many BS talks here. Medicine is probably one of the most safest fields to earn good money nowadays in the US. Sure, CS/finance people make good money when they are young and get promoted when they gets older, but what you don’t see is the job is not secure. Technology evolves every 5-10 years, I am not talking about guideline changing treatment A to treatment B, I am talking about learning new coding system and new algorithm. If you don’t learn you either transition to administration or you get fired. Medicine requires CME, but I have never heard people unable to complete it. In finance, the single most important thing is safety of your capital. Say you make 300K a year, there is self-investment option A: 50% chance of making 600K in 10 years and 50% chance of making 100K in 10 years. Then investment option B: 99.9% chance of making 350K in 10 years. There are a lot of people who will choose plan B. Yes. Medicine will not easily get you a million dollar a year any more like what it used to be. But dude, we are talking about at least 6 folds higher salary then regular median income and on top of that you can easily stretch yourself out and make more. Most specialties have plenty of opportunities for you to make extra money. Technically, even a hospitalist can make up to half a million as long as you work crazy hours. So stop giving people false information, there is a reason the tuition keeps going up because all the spots are still filled. Even If you charge 200K a year there will still be plenty of students who will do it. Because job safety+good salary= best job in the world.

"nowadays" ehh idk. for previous generations, absolutely.

what is most financially concerning about medicine is the immense opportunity cost. the world is changing so fast. now more than ever, you need to be making money early on in life. we are approaching a future where one cannot simply hold a job for 30 years. that won't exist. we are approaching the automation revolution, and blue collar jobs are not immune unlike previous technological revolutions.

this is where medicine will financially ruin some people. most docs, myself included, will reach a net worth of $0 in our mid thirties. meanwhile our relatively successful non-med peers are +$500k-1.5MM throw in declining reimbursement, the inevitable **** to M4A in some capacity, and intelligent computers and mid-levels.... and our job security has eroded over the course of 1-2 decades. and we still have $0 in the bank.

 

[Kuratz]

The opportunity cost aspect of medicine cannot be overstated. Ten years of very hard work is one thing. It's another beast altogether when 4 of those years you are plummeting your net worth to -$250k or worse and then merely trying to stop the bleeding from compound interest with a job that amounts to slightly above what the high-schooler flipping burgers makes. Only then do you get the opportunity to continue working a high stress job ~50h/wk with additional call for the salary. Every cent is earned. Compare this to an engineer etc where if they work an equivalent number of hours they are getting ahead and benefiting from the 10 most important years of compounding interest.

For me the financial dissatisfaction comes from the feeling of abuse and lack of positive feedback from this hard work. I've worked the past 10 weekends and came in around ~85h/wk as an intern (they can and will do this to you, even if there are "rules"). Yet despite this I make less than the new nurse working three 12s, and half of what a new PA or NP does working a lifestyle schedule. Throw in the differential that comes with nights/weekends and the gap widens. So in your late 20s/early 30s not only do you have zero financial flexibility but also extremely minimal work-life balance. It's a huge sacrifice. That same sacrifice gets rewarded handsomely in other fields. It just constantly feels like you are getting taken advantage of as a med student and as a resident because you are effectively handcuffed to the process if you want to eventually practice. I have friends who are in IB, engineering, law etc and when I tell them that I have to work the weekend overnights after a full week and don't get any additional compensation or vacation they have a look of disbelief or pity. If they did that it would be greatly rewarded with a bonus, overtime, promotion or more vacation. I'm not suggesting everyone is cut out for any of those professions but they just all seem to get treated much fairer than in medicine.

I think working 40 years doing something else for $80k but being able to consistently enjoy the evenings and weekends offers a much more rewarding life than medicine. If money is your prerogative then at least you can choose to sacrifice some extra hours on your own terms. You also pay a premium to live in an urban area in the way of lower salaries... which is in direct contrast to almost any other white collar profession. Not to mention the stability of medicine is nowhere near the generations of lore. With private equity and business types calling the shots attendings can and do get laid off. Anyone going into medicine for "the money" is a fool. But by the time you realize it you already have the golden handcuffs. Caveat emptor.

 

[Engrailed]

For such a shallow question, this thread, surprisingly, has some insightful, thoughtful/honest, and/or really entertaining comments. Loved reading (almost) all of them🙂

You all are some intelligent and witty folk

 

[deleted746658]

The opportunity cost aspect of medicine cannot be overstated. Ten years of very hard work is one thing. It's another beast altogether when 4 of those years you are plummeting your net worth to -$250k or worse and then merely trying to stop the bleeding from compound interest with a job that amounts to slightly above what the high-schooler flipping burgers makes. Only then do you get the opportunity to continue working a high stress job ~50h/wk with additional call for the salary. Every cent is earned. Compare this to an engineer etc where if they work an equivalent number of hours they are getting ahead and benefiting from the 10 most important years of compounding interest.

For me the financial dissatisfaction comes from the feeling of abuse and lack of positive feedback from this hard work. I've worked the past 10 weekends and came in around ~85h/wk as an intern (they can and will do this to you, even if there are "rules"). Yet despite this I make less than the new nurse working three 12s, and half of what a new PA or NP does working a lifestyle schedule. Throw in the differential that comes with nights/weekends and the gap widens. So in your late 20s/early 30s not only do you have zero financial flexibility but also extremely minimal work-life balance. It's a huge sacrifice. That same sacrifice gets rewarded handsomely in other fields. It just constantly feels like you are getting taken advantage of as a med student and as a resident because you are effectively handcuffed to the process if you want to eventually practice. I have friends who are in IB, engineering, law etc and when I tell them that I have to work the weekend overnights after a full week and don't get any additional compensation or vacation they have a look of disbelief or pity. If they did that it would be greatly rewarded with a bonus, overtime, promotion or more vacation. I'm not suggesting everyone is cut out for any of those professions but they just all seem to get treated much fairer than in medicine.

I think working 40 years doing something else for $80k but being able to consistently enjoy the evenings and weekends offers a much more rewarding life than medicine. If money is your prerogative then at least you can choose to sacrifice some extra hours on your own terms. You also pay a premium to live in an urban area in the way of lower salaries... which is in direct contrast to almost any other white collar profession. Not to mention the stability of medicine is nowhere near the generations of lore. With private equity and business types calling the shots attendings can and do get laid off. Anyone going into medicine for "the money" is a fool. But by the time you realize it you already have the golden handcuffs. Caveat emptor.

beautifully stated.

i wish i could smack my pre-med self. for all pre-meds reading this, i expect the overwhelming majority of you will regret your decision to enter medicine... should you be so "lucky" to be accepted to med school. even some of the purist, most optimistic individuals in my med school class started to loathe medicine by their 4th year. we all were kinda like "WTF, how did we think this was a good idea?"

medicine on paper is a raw, sh*** f*** deal. the money, the hours, the stress. my non-med friends used to think what i was doing was cool and special and that i was gonna make big bucks. now they realize i am a broke indentured servant to a system that could not give a damn about me. i make sh** money, have terrible hours, work most weekends. unless you are insulated by a group of people all in medicine, you will come to learn that what you signed up for is a rawwwww deal. in the current climate, most of your bright non-med friends will crush you financially.

i finally understand what older docs meant when they told my naive bright eyed premed self that medicine was changing for the worst. medicine is a business, and an ugly one. older docs absolutely f*** us. they abused the system, were greedy, opened the door for midlevels, sold out to private equity.

now we have to deal with the ramifications of their actions, and nothing is guaranteed, because the older docs let suits infiltrate our destroy our profession.

caveat emptor.