Physicians and high income

[Anonymous]

Osteopaths are the JV of physicians. Lower board scores, many I knew didn't get into MD programs the first time around.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I hear my friends in family practice and pediatrics talk about income inequality all the time, more so when neurosurgeons or ortho folks talk about their million plus monthly salaries and luxury cars. It makes one wonder if money was not a big factor, would many of these people still want to help humanity?

No and most certainly not if are an ethinic (Indian, Asian, Persian, Jewish etc) of whom 99.999% go into it for two motivations: $$ and status. It’s mostly cultural. Not a racially biased post so go easy on me. Just reality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I hear my friends in family practice and pediatrics talk about income inequality all the time, more so when neurosurgeons or ortho folks talk about their million plus monthly salaries and luxury cars. It makes one wonder if money was not a big factor, would many of these people still want to help humanity?

PCP from above. If the question is whether I’d do medicine for teacher pay the answer is no. But I’m okay with the current level of pay (basically all doctors make at least 150k). But you have to protect yourself as the system will try to take advantage of you. I would never take a lower paid speciality and have a bad quality of life. That makes no sense to me. I purposely made the trade off I made to be on the lower end and fought and ensured that I worked for a system that gave me the support I needed to have a good work life balance (MA support, call triage) and made it clear that family came first.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hear my friends in family practice and pediatrics talk about income inequality all the time, more so when neurosurgeons or ortho folks talk about their million plus monthly salaries and luxury cars. It makes one wonder if money was not a big factor, would many of these people still want to help humanity?

No and most certainly not if are an ethinic (Indian, Asian, Persian, Jewish etc) of whom 99.999% go into it for two motivations: $$ and status. It’s mostly cultural. Not a racially biased post so go easy on me. Just reality.

So what’s your ethnicity then?

[Anonymous]

You can’t compare teachers and doctors. The type of kid who becomes a doctor has to be a significantly stronger student. Anyone can become a teacher from any tier 3 college.

For the higher paid specialties, one needs high scores and grades. Not anyone can just become a neurosurgeon.

You don’t sound very smart, OP.

[Anonymous]

This is a silly “what if” scenario.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Think back on your high school classmates. For better or for worse, think of the students who later became teachers and those who later became doctors.

personally, while I see similarities in terms of wanting to help people and generally bring kind, good natured people, the doctors-to-be were notably more academically dedicated and successful, by a long shot. They the went on to highly rigorous premed tracks in college, followed by four years of medical school and years of residency and possible fellowships. This is quite different from the early entrance to teaching.

While there are always outliers, and I know several teachers personally who work tremendously long hours and of great impact, I don’t think there’s any real comparison in terms of what salary their skills and experience command.

I remember the premed kids as being grade grubbers and they would cheat - anything to get a good grade. Also fought to be teachers pet. They were not nice people

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Think back on your high school classmates. For better or for worse, think of the students who later became teachers and those who later became doctors.

personally, while I see similarities in terms of wanting to help people and generally bring kind, good natured people, the doctors-to-be were notably more academically dedicated and successful, by a long shot. They the went on to highly rigorous premed tracks in college, followed by four years of medical school and years of residency and possible fellowships. This is quite different from the early entrance to teaching.

While there are always outliers, and I know several teachers personally who work tremendously long hours and of great impact, I don’t think there’s any real comparison in terms of what salary their skills and experience command.

I remember the premed kids as being grade grubbers and they would cheat - anything to get a good grade. Also fought to be teachers pet. They were not nice people

Yep being a doctor is tough. You need these types of people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I hear my friends in family practice and pediatrics talk about income inequality all the time, more so when neurosurgeons or ortho folks talk about their million plus monthly salaries and luxury cars. It makes one wonder if money was not a big factor, would many of these people still want to help humanity?

You lose all credibility when you say this as if all the neuro and ortho people are making 12 million dollars a year. Get a clue.

[Anonymous]

What a novel post, OP! Thanks for bringing this up again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Physicians are always concerned about income and often comparing wealth. Low paying specialties are always complaining and envying others. Would you want to go or send your kids into medicine if income spectrum was similar to teachers?

If physician income was similar to teachers, you’d be condemning your kid to a lifetime of debt he couldn’t pay off for decades.

[Anonymous]

No way these kids would want to "help" others if there was no money in it. Dont bother with all the bs they spew.

Medicine is a business.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Osteopaths are the JV of physicians. Lower board scores, many I knew didn't get into MD programs the first time around.

What an ignorant post!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Of course not. Why take on all that debt not to get paid. It's insane.

This is why our healthcare is so expensive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hear my friends in family practice and pediatrics talk about income inequality all the time, more so when neurosurgeons or ortho folks talk about their million plus monthly salaries and luxury cars. It makes one wonder if money was not a big factor, would many of these people still want to help humanity?

PCP from above. If the question is whether I’d do medicine for teacher pay the answer is no. But I’m okay with the current level of pay (basically all doctors make at least 150k). But you have to protect yourself as the system will try to take advantage of you. I would never take a lower paid speciality and have a bad quality of life. That makes no sense to me. I purposely made the trade off I made to be on the lower end and fought and ensured that I worked for a system that gave me the support I needed to have a good work life balance (MA support, call triage) and made it clear that family came first.

I’m a teacher who got a full ride to college as a biology major and dropped out of pre-med to become a teacher. I entered college as a sophomore because of AP credits. I ONLY say this for everyone to understand I was not at the dumb end of the spectrum and this was a choice I made my sophomore year of college. Sure, you can say I was “weeded” out, but here was my plan. At the end of the day, I wanted the following:

Debt free schooling (college was paid for, why go into huge debt for medicine?)
The ability to have the same days off as my future kids
To choose a helping profession and work with kids

As I teacher, I earn around 120k now and have clearly been doing it for a while to earn that. In the end, I figured pediatrics would end up boring with the endless strep throat, ear infections and immunizations etc and it wouldn’t be all that fun. But teaching is pretty challenging each day and you get more of a relationship with the kids. If I chose pediatrics, I would have more debt, the crappiness of being an on-call resident and have to work year round. I’m still good with my choice.
That said, I think the way we do medical school here is pretty awful and could use some upgrades.