I don't know about what the story the OP posted a link for said b/c it wouldn't come up. I do know that on the TPA (Texas Pharmacy Association) website, they had a link to a story that said pharmacist's salaries actually increased amid this economic mess we find ourselves in.
http://drugtopics.modernmedicine.co...Article/detail/585679?contextCategoryId=47558
I point your gaze to the paragraph directly below the first set of bullet points which talks about the shortage not being solved anytime soon. I don't mean to stir the pot any, but as for new schools saturating the market with sub-par students,
if they can make it through the program and pass the tests to get licensed, what does that mean for all the other non-sub-par students from accredited programs?
An interesting article, I enjoyed that, and thank you for linking it.
I bolded the part of your reply that I would like to address briefly. Several "upstart" Pharmacy schools have not graduated their first class (Tuoro and Cal Northstate in CA alone, I think there are a couple more as well) so we simply do not know how they will perform on state licensure exams - If they fail and the statistical variation is significant in nature, what then? If we can, through time, see the efficacy of said "sub-par candidate" producing schools is poor, what is the impetus for change?
The problem is as it currently is in Psychology, except not quite as pronounced, because as a profession, social services is already paid at a lower premium than anything to do with science. But if you put on your thinking cap, you can apply the over-saturation point from what's happening in Psychology (With upstart Ph.D and Psy.D programs churning our new Ph.D Clinical Psychologists by the bushel).
For the last 20 years, there has been a steady supply of new Psychologists to the market, and this has been maintaining homeostasis in the market, so salaries have remained roughly the same. However, in the most recent 5/6 years, a dozen new "stand alone" Psychology doctorate program-teaching schools have sprung up, accepting students who wouldn't have a snowball's chance at getting into a "real" Ph.D program. These stand-alones have outrageous tuition (Talking up to $300k for a doctorate that will start you off, on national average, at about 55 grand a year) and, on the whole, produce horrible clinicians and researchers. Indeed, some folks who graduate from these programs do end up making fine therapists, however the proof is in the pudding, that the average pass rate for a Psychology Ph.D holder from a non-traditional (read: standalone) university is 28% on the first time through. They also cannot match through APPIC for post-doc internships but anyway that's another subject. Though they can pass state-licensure examinations on the 2nd, 3rd, or 4th try, they dilute the profession as a whole, and existing clinicians who really worked for their degree and respect are alienated.
That, in my opinion, will be the impact of all of these new Pharmacy schools. Even if the graduates enter the market, and pass the exams, the lower standards with which they entered Pharmacy school will create a surplus and eventually lower salary. Does Wal-Mart really care if I went to UCSF or Cal Northstate? Not really. But if I'm from UCSF and expect X salary, and someone from Northstate will be happy with Y salary, (i.e., Wal-Mart can be discerning consumers about who they hire, read: surplus) then over time, Pharmacy as a profession will be devalued.
Will that necessarily come to pass? Who is to say... One thing's for sure, and that's Pharmacy schools make money for the school. Other programs do not, so it's most assuredly a business proposition in opening CoPs, instead of a mindset of creating
quality pharmacists.
Pharmacy, like Psychology, is starting to be about making profit for institutions and less about the actual work (As it pertains to "start up" CoPs). While "sub-par" Pharmacists will not directly affect "non-sub-par" pharmacists, the flood of Pharmacists IN GENERAL in the market has to affect salary, it simply must, economically.
