I agree somewhat that money isnt the end all be all. But i dont see how anyone can just not factor it in or take a school like umich which will put them 150-200k+ more in debt after interest and all. Also that whole family med attending thing doesnt seem like it could be the norm in major cities. In WI sure probably possible, or in small areas like where i used to live in IL. But where i live in cali...a 150k yr salary doesnt take you very far when you consider 3k a month loan payments as well as increased taxes.
Just depends on how you live and what you do. You also have to take into account what your potential earnings are with any given situation. Family medicine is pretty much the worst case scenario in terms of earning which is why I listed it, and it's still more than viable. Sure, if you choose to go into peds or family med, and really want to live in downtown San Francisco or Palo Alto or Newport Beach, you might run into financial problems, but there are plenty of places even in CA that you can do just fine. Most households even in CA earn far less than 150k and most people have student loan debt, much of it is substantial. There are plenty of options and as a physician you're going to be earning far above the national average even with significant amounts of debt. In my experience, every single salary survey or source listing income far underestimtaes what physicians are actually paid. I know this because I was working for the companies that actually paid them. This is a calculated strategy by the AMA and other physician groups, and actually a pretty brilliant one. If people don't think they really make that much money, they'll be much less likely to call for reimbursements to be decreased. Personally, I feel physician salaries are actually a small part of what makes health care so expensive in the US. In the end, administrative overhead from insurance companies and pharma/medical device make up a much larger percentage of where health care dollars are going.
I do agree though you have to be happy. I was accepted at a few schools i just withdrew from as even if they gave me a full tuition scholarship (which wasnt happening but still), I wouldnt have attended as I just didnt like it there. But when im comparing the few schools im looking at now that i like for the most part, thats where i consider money to be a large factor. Also as sorta an aside drizz...i think you go to uw mad right? Do you have much info that you wouldnt mind sharing with me about how the 3rd and 4th yr are set up?
It's sort of complicated, but I'll lay out the basics, as it may be relevant for this thread.
For 3rd year, you start by picking your grid, or what order you'd like your rotations to be in. The core 3rd year rotations are surgery, medicine, psych, peds, ob/gyn, and primary care. You can also choose to do neuroscience 3rd or 4th year (most people do it 3rd) and if you don't do neuroscience, you'll do radiology and anesthesia (most likely, you can do it 4th year also but most people who don't do neuro will do those) There are 40 possible grids to choose from, and you submit your top choices to a lottery, most people get one of their top 5, but honestly, the order isn't all that important.
After that, you choose your "top choice" which is a location in which you want to do one of the programs. Neuroscience, Psych, Surgery, and half of Medicine HAVE to be in Madison, so you can't do those away.
Finally, you do the location lottery, in which you choose which locations you want to do away rotations in. You have to do a minimum of 10-12 weeks (one 6 or 8 week rotation, plus half of medicine)
If you want to, you can definitely do all your rotations in Madison and Milwaukee. However, doing rotations at away sites, while annoying because you are away from your apartment/house in Madison, is also cool because a lot of the away sites have no residents, so med students get to do a lot more. It really depends what you're going into, but for a specialty like medicine, ob/gyn, etc... the away rotations are pretty key.
4th year, you get to do elective extramurals (3-4 months worth depending on how you set up your 3rd year schedule) which can be any number of different things. They can be away (audition) rotations at other schools, additional audition/specialty rotations at UW, additional sub-internships in whatever field you choose, global health rotations, research rotations, whatever. You'll do either anesthesia + radiology or neuroscience depending if you did them 3rd year, one sub-i, two preceptorships which are whatever field you choose at hospitals throughout the state, and you're required to do an additional 4-6 weeks of clinical work in the state. Most people choose to do a rotation in their field of choice at UW.
In general, I think their rotations are structured pretty well. Initially some people find it annoying that they can't do all their rotations at UW (unless they are a parent or are caring for a family member) but to be honest, CSC has a crazy amount of residents/fellows/attendings/PAs/nurses etc, and it's hard to actually do anything as a med student.