The Truth About Physician Salaries

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Bea5T said:
How many of these doctors are residents or new attendings? Doctors in their 40s and 50s financial situations are irrelevant to the current situation. They didn't have anywhere near the tuition and had much more flexibility, especially in terms of private practice. By and large, the most people who dealt with highest tuition rates(undergrad included) have yet to become attendings.
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That is true, but the salaries are still insanely high compared to any other field.

I hate to take a stance like this, but it is becoming more obvious. People on here who can't see that a doctor is financial well off and more so than virtually any other field, needs to go and get a job as anything other than a physician for 3 years and then post again. It blatantly obvious who here hasn't worked in the real world for more than 30 seconds without mom and dad covering your bills.
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Jinxapotato said:
Although a small percentage, some truck drivers also break into the top 1% o.o I guess the UPS graph might not be off by that much after all!
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And so do cashiers. Maybe you should think about a job at 7-11. Maybe that's the field for you instead of this medicine job, eh?
 
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Mjolner said:
I guess this is why the UPS drivers all live in big houses and the doctors drive used civics.

Seriously. People worried about being broke because you're a doctor need to quit school and get a job in ANY OTHER FIELD for a few years and learn that while we all know that guy who's making $500k in finance, there are 50 others making $50k
Being a doctor and complaining about money to the average joe will get you punched. You do realize that the median household income is $50k, right? Tack on 50k for loans and figure $35k for seven years lost income at the national average of $50k and even from day one (if you spread that debt and lost income over ten years) you're making over DOUBLE the average joe even if you do FM.
People here need perspective.
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This x a million
 
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Mjolner said:
That is true, but the salaries are still insanely high compared to any other field.

I hate to take a stance like this, but it is becoming more obvious. People on here who can't see that a doctor is financial well off and more so than virtually any other field, needs to go and get a job as anything other than a physician for 3 years and then post again. It blatantly obvious who here hasn't worked in the real world for more than 30 seconds without mom and dad covering your bills.
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Physicians are underpaid. We're not well compensated enough in order to have a lamborghini, a rolex, a daily supply of cocaine, and 5-10 mistresses on the side.
 
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A rolex is like 5k.. If you cannot buy a rolex on a Physicians salary you need to rethink some of your spending decisions.
 
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68PGunner said:
Physicians are underpaid. We're not well compensated enough in order to have a lamborghini, a rolex, a daily supply of cocaine, and 5-10 mistresses on the side.
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Can't argue with that ;)
 
gmbz said:
A rolex is like 5k.. If you cannot buy a rolex on a Physicians salary you need to rethink some of your spending decisions.
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Or your choice of women.
 
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Ibn Alnafis MD said:
I feel the numbers are a little too high, no?
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Yes, at least 15-20% inflated. Any physician recruitment firm will have questionable numbers, it's how they draw you in. I get "offers" from recruiters with stupid high numbers all the time. They are rarely as advertised.
 
DubVille said:
Yes, at least 15-20% inflated. Any physician recruitment firm will have questionable numbers, it's how they draw you in. I get "offers" from recruiters with stupid high numbers all the time. They are rarely as advertised.
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Here are the MGMA numbers almost identical, except for peds and FM. Hospitalist start off at right around 235k.
 

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psychMDhopefully said:
Here are the MGMA numbers almost identical, except for peds and FM. Hospitalist start off at right around 235k.
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Thanks for posting this! I hope I am wrong but these numbers in my specialty (pm&r) seem inflated too. The numbers sampled are tiny and I'm curious how they sample them. The medscape salary surveys always seemed closer (a bit low) to what I've seen and my attendings have confirmed. Maybe my location is giving me a depressed view of salary potential. Seems unreal that pm&r mean is 325,000+ at 3-7 yrs. Even if doing interventional spine seems a bit high. Dogma from academic and even our community attendings seems to be 190k-275k unless working 60+ hours, super short patient visits/crap documentation, and questionable ethics.

Again thanks for posting, I hope these numbers are more correct.
 
Mjolner said:
How accurate is this?
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More accurate than Medscape, but it can be either a little over or underestimate. They also take in account of the overall benefits.
 
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Mjolner said:
How accurate is this?
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Not in IM, but seems in range for what my seniors when I was an intern (2 yrs ago) were signing for. I keep in touch with my co-interns who did categorical IM. I'd assume they will be in the 220-240k range for hospitalist gigs.
 
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according to that table EM salary peaks at 3-7 years of practice, then gradually falls off....I guess they do want young people on staff...
 
Jinxapotato said:
according to that table EM salary peaks at 3-7 years of practice, then gradually falls off....I guess they do want young people on staff...
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Okay lets use a little common sense here. Maybe just maybe, Older EM docs work less.
 
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Jinxapotato said:
according to that table EM salary peaks at 3-7 years of practice, then gradually falls off....I guess they do want young people on staff...
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No, it's more like EPs get burnt out and work less. This is one of the best quotes from White Coat Investor in which many EPs agree upon:
"The secret to longevity in emergency medicine is to work less, be financially secure, and have the freedom to explore the academic and professional interests that come up along the way."
New med students and premeds want to jump into EM, but know very little about it. EM has a relatively shorter career compare to other area in medicine.
 
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Bea5T said:
How many of these doctors are residents or new attendings? Doctors in their 40s and 50s financial situations are irrelevant to the current situation. They didn't have anywhere near the tuition and had much more flexibility, especially in terms of private practice. By and large, the most people who dealt with highest tuition rates(undergrad included) have yet to become attendings.
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I guess I've just never met a financially-burdened doctor, young or old. Doesn't matter if you have large school debts when you have a large salary.

Here's some perspective - before my current job, I was making ~36k/year at my first post-college position. I also had about 40k in student loan debt. I lived reasonably well in a medium cost of living city (Minneapolis). I had a nice place, went out for drinks when I wanted, dated, went out with friends whenever, and saved money. On 36 grand a year. 1/5th of what a relatively low-earning physician would make. My current job is about 85-90k with bonuses. On my base, a little more than half that number, I live very well. 100% of my bonuses go into investment accounts, so I don't even include that in my living expenses. I can't even imagine doubling my overall salary, which would still be on the low end of a physician's payscale. I would be ****ting on a golden throne daily.

I've said it before, I'll say it again - 99% of the people complaining about salaries in these threads have never had a real job/career and they don't understand money. When I was 15, I thought I needed 350k/year to live nicely. Now I realize just how far money can go when you're smart enough to handle it wisely. Looking at projected debts and incomes as a physician in the fields I'd like to go into, they will easily afford me a beautiful house, fancy cars, nice vacations, and a multi-million dollar retirement. Sounds real awful, I know.
 
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Daiichi said:
I guess I've just never met a financially-burdened doctor, young or old. Doesn't matter if you have large school debts when you have a large salary.

Here's some perspective - before my current job, I was making ~36k/year at my first post-college position. I also had about 40k in student loan debt. I lived reasonably well in a medium cost of living city (Minneapolis). I had a nice place, went out for drinks when I wanted, dated, went out with friends whenever, and saved money. On 36 grand a year. 1/5th of what a relatively low-earning physician would make. My current job is about 85-90k with bonuses. On my base, a little more than half that number, I live very well. 100% of my bonuses go into investment accounts, so I don't even include that in my living expenses. I can't even imagine doubling my overall salary, which would still be on the low end of a physician's payscale. I would be ****ting on a golden throne daily.

I've said it before, I'll say it again - 99% of the people complaining about salaries in these threads have never had a real job/career and they don't understand money. When I was 15, I thought I needed 350k/year to live nicely. Now I realize just how far money can go when you're smart enough to handle it wisely. Looking at projected debts and incomes as a physician in the fields I'd like to go into, they will easily afford me a beautiful house, fancy cars, nice vacations, and a multi-million dollar retirement. Sounds real awful, I know.
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Yup, my current job pays me about 45-50K/yr. I have a wife and two kids at home that I need to support. Yet, we go to a movie once a week, eat out 3-4 times a week, and take 2-3 2-3 wks vacations per year. On top of that, I also maxed out my ROTH accounts for both my wife and I at $11,000 a yr. Let's just say that if my salary increases by 4x, I will take much more risk in my investment choices.
 
68PGunner said:
Yup, my current job pays me about 45-50K/yr. I have a wife and two kids at home that I need to support. Yet, we go to a movie once a week, eat out 3-4 times a week, and take 2-3 2-3 wks vacations per year. On top of that, I also maxed out my ROTH accounts for both my wife and I at $11,000 a yr. Let's just say that if my salary increases by 4x, I will take much more risk in my investment choices.
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Wow you must be good with money then...I use 20k on my own per year :( and I don't even eat out or go to movies that often
 
Jinxapotato said:
Wow you must be good with money then...I use 20k on my own per year :( and I don't even eat out or go to movies that often
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I learn one thing in life: the more you spend, the more perks you get back. Every year, I literally get an extra $2,000-3,000 a year free money to spend due to perks and awards from credit card companies. At restaurants, I literally get free desserts and ice creams for the kids due to our bill. On top of that, I get like a bunch of 15-20% from american express platinum on items. For my tax return, I chose to elect getting some of my returns in amazon credits due to every $100 returned as amazon credit will have $106 in buying power. My wife continues to be amazed at our spending habit and the stuff we get despite my paycheck.

I grew up in a poor family, so I always try to maximize my spending power. However, I'm also not a penny-pincher. Life is too short. Instead of being a slave to the $$$, I seek to use the $$$ go maximize our family's happiness.
 
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I have been reading this thread for awhile and interested in what everyone has to say. I just have a few questions. Through reading this thread a lot of people are talking about attendings they know when they were interns or people they know and how much they earn. Are attendings and people you meet who are physicians open to talking about how much money they make and stuff, cause I thought money was a topic you don't normally ask about.

Also anyone recommend good reads about how to properly invest or "spend money in a smart way" where it can make you more money? Thanks!
 
HuskyPride149 said:
I have been reading this thread for awhile and interested in what everyone has to say. I just have a few questions. Through reading this thread a lot of people are talking about attendings they know when they were interns or people they know and how much they earn. Are attendings and people you meet who are physicians open to talking about how much money they make and stuff, cause I thought money was a topic you don't normally ask about.

Also anyone recommend good reads about how to properly invest or "spend money in a smart way" where it can make you more money? Thanks!
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Buy The White Coat Investor book. I started it yesterday. Amazing.
 
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HuskyPride149 said:
I have been reading this thread for awhile and interested in what everyone has to say. I just have a few questions. Through reading this thread a lot of people are talking about attendings they know when they were interns or people they know and how much they earn. Are attendings and people you meet who are physicians open to talking about how much money they make and stuff, cause I thought money was a topic you don't normally ask about.
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No attending is stupid to tell you how much they make in person, except on SDN because of anonymous lol. Surveys like MGMA and Medscape compensation are physicians self-reported annually. It gives ppl a rough estimate of how good or bad each field is doing. New attendings can use the number to shop around new jobs in different regions and in private or academic practice. Nobody likes to be underpaid, but not everybody can be in the 99% income.
 
JustPlainBill said:
There's a paper going around on Facebook that works out the salary vs length of time in training -- the primary care fields -- FM, IM, OB/Gyn, Peds -- wind up making about as much as a beginning elementary school teacher if you equate the amount of time spent training -- the specialists are only marginally more well compensated;

If you went into medicine to make money, you're in the wrong business -- I'm not being altruistic -- it's a secure, decent living -- but the days of making lots of cash as a physician ended in the 80s; If your classmates are in this for the money, tell them to get out now before they've been through the pain that is residency and the massive debt -- go into pharmaceutical sales, be a golf pro or finance a UC clinic or whatever ---
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This good ol days or grass igoos mentality exists in all professions.
 
Just out of curiosity, my family doctor (and pretty much the father I never had) has told me if I go into FM I could be making ~300k or more like he does.

I'm kinda skeptical of this..... he does work four days a week in rural south seeing 75-100 pts a day though

thoughts?
 
GreenScrubss said:
Just out of curiosity, my family doctor (and pretty much the father I never had) has told me if I go into FM I could be making ~300k or more like he does.

I'm kinda skeptical of this..... he does work four days a week in rural south seeing 75-100 pts a day though

thoughts?
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That pay sounds reasonable given the number of patients he sees...I mean assuming he works 8h days, he'd AT LEAST have to see around 10 pt an hour, that's 6 minutes per patient, back to back to back. I don't know HOW but dam that's fast.
 
Jinxapotato said:
Although a small percentage, some truck drivers also break into the top 1% o.o I guess the UPS graph might not be off by that much after all!
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Keep in mind that is the number of people with that job that live in households that are in the one percent. In other words, that could be a trucker with a doctor for a wife, or a couple that runs a cab service in which one of them drives and the other manages the business and other employees, or any number of other scenarios.

Though, my uncle used to make 130k/year as a trucker. For Haliburton. In Iraq.
 
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Mad Jack said:
Keep in mind that is the number of people with that job that live in households that are in the one percent. In other words, that could be a trucker with a doctor for a wife, or a couple that runs a cab service in which one of them drives and the other manages the business and other employees, or any number of other scenarios.

Though, my uncle used to make 130k/year as a trucker. For Haliburton. In Iraq.
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You'd have to pay me 3 times that to drive a truck in Iraq.
 
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GreenScrubss said:
Just out of curiosity, my family doctor (and pretty much the father I never had) has told me if I go into FM I could be making ~300k or more like he does.

I'm kinda skeptical of this..... he does work four days a week in rural south seeing 75-100 pts a day though

thoughts?
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If he sees ~350pts/week and work 48 weeks a year, then he's seeing 16800 pts a year. That's more than 3x the number of pts a regular PCP sees. Your doctor should be making at least 500k.

You can run the numbers if you like. The most billed CPT code is 99213. This is for a normal follow up visit. The work RVU (not total RVU) for this code is 0.97. Medi-care reimburses ~$35/RVU, so the wRVU for 99213 is $34. Now you can multiply this by the number of pts your doctor sees per year to get an idea about how much money he makes.
 
Jinxapotato said:
That pay sounds reasonable given the number of patients he sees...I mean assuming he works 8h days, he'd AT LEAST have to see around 10 pt an hour, that's 6 minutes per patient, back to back to back. I don't know HOW but dam that's fast.
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He works 11-12 hour days. I'm actually his medical scribe , so yeah I can vouch that he is super fast and efficent
 
Ibn Alnafis MD said:
If he sees ~350pts/week and work 48 weeks a year, then he's seeing 16800 pts a year. That's more than 3x the number of pts a regular PCP sees. Your doctor should be making at least 500k.
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And he might be. I believe he said "It was possible for me to make 300k-500k" but I figured the latter would be unobtainable for FM.

He also flys out to both coasts (grandchildren) at least once a month which lower that # as well.
 
GreenScrubss said:
And he might be. I believe he said "It was possible for me to make 300k-500k" but I figured the latter would be unobtainable for FM.

He also flys out to both coasts (grandchildren) at least once a month which lower that # as well.
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Whether it's 300 or 500k, that's still a ton of money.

I wonder though, how much time does he spend with each patient?
 
Ibn Alnafis MD said:
Whether it's 300 or 500k, that's still a ton of money.

I wonder though, how much time does he spend with each patient?
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I'm with him all the time and it's literally going from one room to the other with a break in pts every now and then.

He prob sees average 8-15 an hour. I can't really explain how but he is ptetty efficent. Some pts take 20 mins or more.

He actually has a partner who sees roughly the same #.

Im pretty sure both of them started doing this last ten years or so.
 
psychMDhopefully said:
Average Fm salary is up to about 230k now. Look at this chart, thats how much doctors get paid in salary vs how much revenue they bring in. eye opener.


http://www.jacksoncoker.com/Static/Resources/Physician-Salary-Calculator
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Opportunity costs... how do they work?

Student loans... how do they work?

Taking a snapshot (OMG, this physician makes in the 1%)...

while ignoring every thing else (It took him at least 8 years from high school to really get a full time job... and then another 3 years minimum making about next to minimum wage for hours worked while collecting 7% APR debt on $2-500K in student loan debt while working in a job where where you have ultimate responsibility (i.e. I wasn't trained in __, so you can't hold me responsible for this!) in a field where you can do everything right and still be sued into destitute (because malpractice lawsuits aren't about bad outcomes and not bad care, right?)) is a fair comparison.

Tell me again why physicians should be paid less than the hospital's C-suite? After all, I don't see this amount of pre-med/med student outrage (OUTRAGE I say!) over the hospital CEO making bank... or the insurance CEOs. It's the physician who spent his/her 20s and 30s learning to prefect medicine who is the cost destroying healthcare.


Oh, and I bet all of the "ZOMG, PHYSICIANS ARE OVER PAID" in this group will happily see an NP for everything, right? After all, studies show equal outcomes.

Blue Cross, Blue Shields executive compensation in 2012 (this is from a 2015 article) was $61m. But it's the physician making $250k/year that's the problem according to a lot of people in this thread.
 
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NurWollen said:
You'd have to pay me 3 times that to drive a truck in Iraq.
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There are a bunch of soldiers driving trucks in Iraq and Afghanistan for just $25-30k/yr. Just be glad that there're people like those for you. Otherwise, your butt would mandated to do the same crap via the draft for such meager wage.
 
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For a lot of life situations, it doesn't matter if you make 200k or 500k. It is your spending habits and how you manage your money that will make the difference.
 
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scoKraz4 said:
For a lot of life situations, it doesn't matter if you make 200k or 500k. It is your spending habits and how you manage your money that will make the difference.
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Eh, $200k a year also makes a pretty big difference. Two people with similar spending habits and both having, say, a 70% DTI (which is stupid high), the person who makes $14,000 a month will be much better off than the person making $2,000 a month.

Whoever preached that spending habits are more important than income probably wanted to feel better about not having more income. They are both important.
 
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HooahDOc said:
Eh, $200k a year also makes a pretty big difference. Two people with similar spending habits and both having, say, a 70% DTI (which is stupid high), the person who makes $14,000 a month will be much better off than the person making $2,000 a month.

Whoever preached that spending habits are more important than income probably wanted to feel better about not having more income. They are both important.
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Of course they are both important, but if the person who makes 14k a month has a few high end cars, a 6 bedroom house they are paying mortgage on, excessive spending on clothes/electronics, etc. It doesn't matter that they are making that much. If you make 500k a year after taxes and spend 490k a year and you are barely putting any away for retirement/investments/etc. I know a lot of people who make great salaries but don't handle it well and are in debt and barely have anything left over and other people who make 40-50k a year that are doing just fine with not nearly as much financial strain as those I described before. It is completely reliant on the person.

For you it might make a huge difference but most people are not good at managing money.
 
@scoKraz4 You're assuming the person making 500k a year has terrible spending habits. Yes, if a person making 500k a year spends 490k a year (we'll ignore taxes for now), they're going to be worse off than the person making 200k a year. That just goes without saying. I think the point is, all things being equal, you'll have a much more financially stable life pulling in 2.5x the salary.
 
Take a look at Doximity's salary map at https://www.doximity.com/careers for salary information. It provides a great wealth of information for free.
Screenshot 2016-03-05 10.31.40.png
 
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