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> Your first link does not show numbers much different from the previous article linked. Correct. I cited that link because it more clearly shows that those nu

> Your first link does not show numbers much different from the previous article linked. Correct. I cited that link because it more clearly shows that those numbers refer to the debt upon graduation from medical school, not the date at which the income numbers in the previous article become relevant (which comes several years after the completion of residency). I'm not sure why you selectively quote that one phrase from the second link (which in context is not saying that $100K isn't a lot; it's really just a warning about how much worse it is to triple the principal on a debt with compound interest), and yet ignore the clear evidence that it does, in fact, take decades to pay off the debt (and even then, that's just to break even). Even if you don't like those particular links, it's pretty easy to corroborate that elsewhere. Earning a "comfortable income" on paper is not very meaningful when you could be well into your fifties and still be behind where you would have been at 25 had you dropped out of college at 20 and gone to work for Wall Street or a startup, or pretty much any other high paying job that someone of that caliber would also be capable of. On top of that, as I already said, the income statistics for private practice physicians don't factor in many of the costs associated with maintaining a practice, so it's more like talking about the revenue of a small business than the income of an individual. Medicine isn't really that secure a job anymore, either, contrary to popular belief. That's why so many practices have had to close in the last ten years, and why physician salaries, for those not in private practice, have been on a sharp decline. It's really popular to hate on physicians for supposedly making a lot of money for a supposedly cushy job. That may have been true once, but it's not really true anymore, and it's becoming even less and less true very quickly.

pcrh 12y ago
I am very familiar with the medical profession, I teach them and review their grant and fellowship applications. In no way conceivable is the debt incurred by medical students an irrational one, unless they hate medicine and wish they had chosen a different career. The only way on which the debt incurred becomes an unusual burden is if they don't subsequently obtain positions commensurate with their training. Comparing the income of Wall Street traders to physicians is bogus, the skills required are very different , and Wall Street is much more competitive and cut-throat than the medical profession is. "It's really popular to hate on physicians for supposedly making a lot of money for a supposedly cushy job." Medicine is still a very well paid and cushy job: try asking qualified lawyers doing document review for $20 an hour with equivalent debt to newly trained physicians what they think of the matter.
- chimeracoder 12y ago
  > Comparing the income of Wall Street traders to physicians is bogus, the skills required are very different , and Wall Street is much more competitive and cut-throat than the medical profession is. It's really not a bogus comparison. Comparing to the average wage of all professions is meaningless, since a prospective doctor would be capable of getting a top paying job if he decided not to go to medical school. The proper comparison is between two jobs that a prospective doctor might choose. More than half of all medical school applicants take a year or more off in between college and medical school, and Wall Street and medical schools are indirectly competing for a lot of the same talent - a person who decides medical school is too heavy of a financial burden may very well choose to work in finance instead. Students graduating from top-tier engineering schools, for example, are prime candidates for both fields (and it is not uncommon for someone with an engineering degree to work for a few years in finance before deciding to go to medical school) As I said before, it easily takes 30 years or more before medical school starts to look like a good financial decision, and that's assuming you make it that far without burning out and leaving the profession (as many do). That time frame is increasing, not decreasing, which means medicine is becoming a less attractive or sensible financial decision for the top-tier candidates, who are theoretically the very people one would most want to be performing one's open-heart surgery twenty years from now.
  - foobarqux 12y ago
    Specialist medicine beats finance in many ways, particularly lifestyle. (Autonomy, work hours, vacation). I don't believe the 30 year figure for specialists (Being a physician isn't that great). As always going to a top school changes the calculus significantly compared to everywhere else.
    - chimeracoder 12y ago
      > Specialist medicine beats finance in many ways, particularly lifestyle. (Autonomy, work hours, vacation). If you're in private practice, maybe, but that's really not the case anymore. And in any case, private practices are a dying breed. If you're an employed doctor, you have essentially zero autonomy with regards to your practice, your work hours aren't that flexible (or forgiving), and you don't get that much vacation time. What you describe certainly did apply to doctors one or two generations ago, and still applies to some of the outliers today, but it's not true for the vast majority of doctors anymore, and the direction of the trend is very clear and has been for many years. > As always going to a top school changes the calculus significantly compared to everywhere else. Not as much as the residency and/or fellowship does. The top schools charge more, but ceteris paribus, the residency is a better predictor of how much money you can make. Both of those effects, however, are swamped by whether or not a doctor actually lasts long enough after their fellowship to become one of those incredibly lucky high-earners. As much as people might not want to believe it, specialty medicine is a very competitive and cut-throat world, and there's a reason that so many would-be doctors burn out before ever seeing the thick paychecks referenced in this thread. > I don't believe the 30 year figure for specialists It's true, though if you choose not to believe it, I'm not going to argue the point further.

pcrh 12y ago

I am very familiar with the medical profession, I teach them and review their grant and fellowship applications. In no way conceivable is the debt incurred by medical students an irrational one, unless they hate medicine and wish they had chosen a different career. The only way on which the debt incurred becomes an unusual burden is if they don't subsequently obtain positions commensurate with their training. Comparing the income of Wall Street traders to physicians is bogus, the skills required are very different , and Wall Street is much more competitive and cut-throat than the medical profession is. "It's really popular to hate on physicians for supposedly making a lot of money for a supposedly cushy job." Medicine is still a very well paid and cushy job: try asking qualified lawyers doing document review for $20 an hour with equivalent debt to newly trained physicians what they think of the matter.

chimeracoder 12y ago
> Comparing the income of Wall Street traders to physicians is bogus, the skills required are very different , and Wall Street is much more competitive and cut-throat than the medical profession is. It's really not a bogus comparison. Comparing to the average wage of all professions is meaningless, since a prospective doctor would be capable of getting a top paying job if he decided not to go to medical school. The proper comparison is between two jobs that a prospective doctor might choose. More than half of all medical school applicants take a year or more off in between college and medical school, and Wall Street and medical schools are indirectly competing for a lot of the same talent - a person who decides medical school is too heavy of a financial burden may very well choose to work in finance instead. Students graduating from top-tier engineering schools, for example, are prime candidates for both fields (and it is not uncommon for someone with an engineering degree to work for a few years in finance before deciding to go to medical school) As I said before, it easily takes 30 years or more before medical school starts to look like a good financial decision, and that's assuming you make it that far without burning out and leaving the profession (as many do). That time frame is increasing, not decreasing, which means medicine is becoming a less attractive or sensible financial decision for the top-tier candidates, who are theoretically the very people one would most want to be performing one's open-heart surgery twenty years from now.
- foobarqux 12y ago
  Specialist medicine beats finance in many ways, particularly lifestyle. (Autonomy, work hours, vacation). I don't believe the 30 year figure for specialists (Being a physician isn't that great). As always going to a top school changes the calculus significantly compared to everywhere else.
  - chimeracoder 12y ago
    > Specialist medicine beats finance in many ways, particularly lifestyle. (Autonomy, work hours, vacation). If you're in private practice, maybe, but that's really not the case anymore. And in any case, private practices are a dying breed. If you're an employed doctor, you have essentially zero autonomy with regards to your practice, your work hours aren't that flexible (or forgiving), and you don't get that much vacation time. What you describe certainly did apply to doctors one or two generations ago, and still applies to some of the outliers today, but it's not true for the vast majority of doctors anymore, and the direction of the trend is very clear and has been for many years. > As always going to a top school changes the calculus significantly compared to everywhere else. Not as much as the residency and/or fellowship does. The top schools charge more, but ceteris paribus, the residency is a better predictor of how much money you can make. Both of those effects, however, are swamped by whether or not a doctor actually lasts long enough after their fellowship to become one of those incredibly lucky high-earners. As much as people might not want to believe it, specialty medicine is a very competitive and cut-throat world, and there's a reason that so many would-be doctors burn out before ever seeing the thick paychecks referenced in this thread. > I don't believe the 30 year figure for specialists It's true, though if you choose not to believe it, I'm not going to argue the point further.