Feeling like a tremendous loser bc of my career path

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know this is going to generate a lot of eye rolls. But I had no idea when choosing a career path how dramatic the differences in income would become by middle age or how much I handicapped myself early on from more lucrative career choices. I am not starving. I make $230K/year as a primary care doctor. But my classmates who made different choices are now earning triple my income; friends who are law partners making $1-4M/year; and they consider that chump change next to the tech and finance people who pull as much or more. I just had no idea how disparate things would become.

Go look at your pediatrics friends. I promise you, even the sub specialists are making a whole lot less than you are and they had to go to fellowship to get their jobs.

OP. I also did a 2-year fellowship, and a graduate degree in public health.

So you're doing primary care despite doing a fellowship and have a degree in public health? There's nothing wrong with primary care, it is a very important job to your average patient. You serve a lot of people in your daily life. But I do wonder what happened if you completed a fellowship but still do primary care.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have similar feelings. I’m 48, my best friend from college and I graduated with similar grades. I went into the federal government and he went into marketing, similar salaries to start. We’ve both risen toward the top of our fields, I make just over $200k and he’s in the millions. I know this is incredibly naive but I never thought about my trajectory when I was 22 and how limited my choices would be later compared to going into business field. I’m very envious of people who chose a more lucrative path.

Your friends likely started a company to make this much in marketing. Why would you compare someone trying to achieve wealth doing entrepreneurial things and someone working a job for wages.

My friend is the global head of marketing for a brand everyone here would know. He does a lot of international travel for work and I know works harder than I do under stressful conditions, although my budget it larger. Still, he’s a tough one to compare with.

[Anonymous]

Nothing if forcing you to be primary care. You can specialize or move to a lcol area and make more.

[Anonymous]

Smoke weed and drink. You will feel better!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have similar feelings. I’m 48, my best friend from college and I graduated with similar grades. I went into the federal government and he went into marketing, similar salaries to start. We’ve both risen toward the top of our fields, I make just over $200k and he’s in the millions. I know this is incredibly naive but I never thought about my trajectory when I was 22 and how limited my choices would be later compared to going into business field. I’m very envious of people who chose a more lucrative path.

You realize you can leave federal service, right? If you're north of $200, you're either an SES, at CISA with cyberpay, a medical professional, or at a regulator. Any of which has lucrative exit options into the private sector.

I left the government a year ago and now make seven figures. Which is rare, I admit, but I've changed career paths about four times to find my way here. Sitting around and waiting for it to happen to me wasn't going to cut it.

Did you leave at 48? If so, well done! It can be challenging to find a lucrative private sector job at that age.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have similar feelings. I’m 48, my best friend from college and I graduated with similar grades. I went into the federal government and he went into marketing, similar salaries to start. We’ve both risen toward the top of our fields, I make just over $200k and he’s in the millions. I know this is incredibly naive but I never thought about my trajectory when I was 22 and how limited my choices would be later compared to going into business field. I’m very envious of people who chose a more lucrative path.

You realize you can leave federal service, right? If you're north of $200, you're either an SES, at CISA with cyberpay, a medical professional, or at a regulator. Any of which has lucrative exit options into the private sector.

I left the government a year ago and now make seven figures. Which is rare, I admit, but I've changed career paths about four times to find my way here. Sitting around and waiting for it to happen to me wasn't going to cut it.

Did you leave at 48? If so, well done! It can be challenging to find a lucrative private sector job at that age.

PP. I left at 44.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You are focusing on the outliers who achieved great success in their fields while most in these very fields earn a lot less.

Tech? It pays less than what you do unless you are a founder of a successful startup, investor or a super talented engineer in a niche field with patents to your name, or a government contractor with lots of employees (e.g. business owner).

Finance? only pays in revenue generating tracks, and that goes for privately owned companies, there are many more "support" and BAU roles in Finance that pay about the same as what you earn or less.

Law? If you are a law associate or in-house lawyer you aren't making 7 figures. Most with law degrees never make it to partner level or even break into the Big Law.

Maybe if you specialized in medicine you would have made more, maybe you still can? If not, you could try to grow your career by focusing on leadership and administration in the hospital system setting. One of my friends got into that and works more standard hours and gets more pay.

I am comparing myself not to strangers but to peers—former classmates and friends who have done better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know this is going to generate a lot of eye rolls. But I had no idea when choosing a career path how dramatic the differences in income would become by middle age or how much I handicapped myself early on from more lucrative career choices. I am not starving. I make $230K/year as a primary care doctor. But my classmates who made different choices are now earning triple my income; friends who are law partners making $1-4M/year; and they consider that chump change next to the tech and finance people who pull as much or more. I just had no idea how disparate things would become.

Go look at your pediatrics friends. I promise you, even the sub specialists are making a whole lot less than you are and they had to go to fellowship to get their jobs.

OP. I also did a 2-year fellowship, and a graduate degree in public health.

So you're doing primary care despite doing a fellowship and have a degree in public health? There's nothing wrong with primary care, it is a very important job to your average patient. You serve a lot of people in your daily life. But I do wonder what happened if you completed a fellowship but still do primary care.

FYI not all fellowships lead to lucrative specialties. Public health, Heath policy, rheumatology, infectious disease, geriatrics, endocrinology, palliative care for example don’t pay well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Nothing if forcing you to be primary care. You can specialize or move to a lcol area and make more.

Uh no you can’t; it’s almost impossible to retrain into a different specialty once you have completed one. The government will not fund a hospital for you to complete another residency.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You are focusing on the outliers who achieved great success in their fields while most in these very fields earn a lot less.

Tech? It pays less than what you do unless you are a founder of a successful startup, investor or a super talented engineer in a niche field with patents to your name, or a government contractor with lots of employees (e.g. business owner).

Finance? only pays in revenue generating tracks, and that goes for privately owned companies, there are many more "support" and BAU roles in Finance that pay about the same as what you earn or less.

Law? If you are a law associate or in-house lawyer you aren't making 7 figures. Most with law degrees never make it to partner level or even break into the Big Law.

Maybe if you specialized in medicine you would have made more, maybe you still can? If not, you could try to grow your career by focusing on leadership and administration in the hospital system setting. One of my friends got into that and works more standard hours and gets more pay.

I am comparing myself not to strangers but to peers—former classmates and friends who have done better.

OP, if you really want to make big money, use your medical degree to endorse a cure for baldness pill or a fountain of youth drink.

[Anonymous]

I think OP is doing great. I'm making 160K in my mid 40's at a Federal government job with an MBA and very few of my friends are doing financially better than me. OP's profession as a primary care doctor is highly respected and valued with a great salary.

If OP feels inadequate, then it's time to make new friends and stop hanging out with the top 1%. Also, not everyone that is rich is truly happy.

[Anonymous]

I am a primary care doctor and have been in an administrative role for a few years making quite a bit of money...I am looking at primary care roles again that pay what you earn, more or less. The grass isn't always greener - and the subspecialists are many in my administrative type of role and fled a lifestyle they disliked, for a pay cut. It's all relative. Find your hobbies and purpose outside of medicine, live for that and don't focus on past decisions or regrets. I have many and spent too long doing that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You are focusing on the outliers who achieved great success in their fields while most in these very fields earn a lot less.

Tech? It pays less than what you do unless you are a founder of a successful startup, investor or a super talented engineer in a niche field with patents to your name, or a government contractor with lots of employees (e.g. business owner).

Finance? only pays in revenue generating tracks, and that goes for privately owned companies, there are many more "support" and BAU roles in Finance that pay about the same as what you earn or less.

Law? If you are a law associate or in-house lawyer you aren't making 7 figures. Most with law degrees never make it to partner level or even break into the Big Law.

Maybe if you specialized in medicine you would have made more, maybe you still can? If not, you could try to grow your career by focusing on leadership and administration in the hospital system setting. One of my friends got into that and works more standard hours and gets more pay.

I am comparing myself not to strangers but to peers—former classmates and friends who have done better.

How many of all of the people you know have done better? and how much better? Do you also consider those who had done worse than you? Where does it put you? If you are the comparison type of person you have to look towards the bottom feeders and consider them in your statistics of probability of success in your field/education, etc. too. You might end up being somewhere in the middle. Sure you have some wealthy friends who had done much better, but are they minority of majority of all the others you know? You are still comparing yourself to the tippy top and ignoring averages and bottoms , which is a robber of happiness

[Anonymous]

Are there any advantages to your job in terms of QOL? How intense is it compared to what your more successful peers do? Are you on call, covering emergencies, working long weird hours, night shifts? Do you have a lot of stress and high liability? Do you work for a hospital or a bigger office that exploits you and puts you on a treadmill, making you exhausted by the end of the day? Do you have any flexibility with your hours or ability to work part time in the future? All of these matter.

[Anonymous]

Honestly, make some friends in a different peer group. I'm serious. Comparison is making you miserable. If you hung out with me the bureaucrat and my neighbors who are teachers, PAs, and people in retail operations, you'd be the wealthy and successful one.