My brother-in-law is a veterinarian who primarily practices in Virginia but is licensed to practice in Colorado, Wyoming and California, too. He spent the firs

My brother-in-law is a veterinarian who primarily practices in Virginia but is licensed to practice in Colorado, Wyoming and California, too. He spent the first 10 years or so of his career as an emergency vet, first with full-time employment at a clinic and then increasingly picking up relief shifts at a set of clinics around the region (and occasionally even out of state). Here are a few facts: * Relief vets can charge $250-325/hr for a 12hr shift, plus a percentage of their production (= revenue share), often 20-25%. This means a single relief shift can net an experienced vet upwards of $3000. * Frequently, clinics will pay travel expenses for relief vets if they can't find any local. * Just like the AMA, the VMA restricts the number of new vets in the pipeline, so there's a scarcity of skilled labor. * It used to be that vets got paid about the same as independent family practitioners -- in the $150-200k/yr range * The rise of veterinary insurance is what is primarily responsible for the dramatically increased charge rates in veterinary medicine. Since an insurer will pay, vets can charge. This has had the effect of turning what was a $2000 surgery into a $8000 surgery, or a $75 vaccination into a $250 vaccination. * Private Equity and corporatization (e.g. Banfield, Petco) have been ruining things for independent vets and also pet owners. Yes, you sometimes get the convenience efficiencies of a corporate service with plug & play employees, but everything else goes downhill. The effects mirror what the human healthcare industry has been experiencing. * Startup costs for a new clinic can be as low as about $400k once you have the office lease. Lots of the equipment is leased to clinics so the capital expense to get running is pretty low and the costs are easy to amortize over time through operational cashflow. * Lots of vets -- my brother-in-law included -- have said "to hell with this" and started concierge services. It's pretty easy to make a good living with VERY low stress if you only have 40-50 subscribing clients, and the hassle and headache is lightyears lower than working for a clinic (especially a corporate clinic). * Board certified vets get paid the same as people doctors, especially in specialities (ophthalmology, dermatology, neurology, etc). $300-600k/yr depending on region, and that's just the base salary. * A well-run veterinary clinic in a mid-sized city that has 2-3 vets on duty at any given time can easily gross >$100k in a weekend. It's not unusual for my bro-in-law to drive $25k production during a single relief shift, and that's completely above board, high quality medical work using established price lists -- not any kind of gouging. The ones making bank are the clinic owners, and until very recently (convenient carve out to appease private equity -- boo!) there was a requirement (just like dental offices) that clinic had to be owned by DVMs. Now that this isn't true, you've seen massive buyouts and franchise growth driven by both corporate interests and PE. We as consumers are suffering for it.