Airhoss

I spent Saturday with a friend and his brother. The brother is a 4th year med student at CU. His tuition alone is 100K a year. He says he'll have just at 500K student loan debt on graduation day.

After an ER residency of approximately 4 years where he'll make low wages he can expect to top out as an ER doctor at about 250K a year.

Medicine is a tough way to go.

Law school isn't worth the time or effort or money at the moment. there are no more sure deals anymore.

northwestdc10

Hoss, as a current undergraduate who has done a lot of research and is looking at medical school, I just felt inclined to call out some misleading things in your posting.

First, the average medical school debt is 159K. Obviously there are outliers - some with none, your bud with 500K (I'd say 80K for pilot career is extreme as well), but 159 is the average.

Second, there is no medical school that charges 100K per year for tuition (yet, at least.) Granted, many of these rates are still nasty. Factor in living expenses and it's expensive as hell. Here are the figures for you:

https://services.aamc.org/tsfreports..._of_study=2012

The most critical thing for those looking at medicine these days is to aim for your state school or the USUHS (military medical school - there are a few other military programs as well). Obviously the tricky thing is to get in to one of those very few select schools, but it's still financially a good prospect if you can get in to one of those. The Canadian medical schools have their **** together too and those are options as well, though they are hard to get into as an American. It's out-of state or private medical schools where you will incur massive (200K +) debt. If I can get into my state school or a Canadian medical school, especially one of those where I have relatives, I can keep the debt-load in the five figure range.

Just to point out as well, there is still excellent job security. However, I am all with you that there are really no secure paths these days. I think it's pathetic that medical students have become burdened with debt and that it's a really alarming indication in the country. Your friend with 500K is basically handcuffed to the job now and is going to have that hanging over him forever. Soon enough medicine will consist of basically the super rich who can afford to get into it, and the heavily indebted who are screwed, with a few military.

I'm not a kool-aid drinker. I acknowledge many positive aspects to the career, especially if you can keep the debt load down, but I still find the new trends in medicine to be VERY alarming. If I cannot get into my state school/military/Canadian medical school, I will have to go to my backup career. I cannot afford to go to any other schools and medicine is not worth it for 200K + loans.

Didn't mean to insult you or anything, but just wanted to make sure others didn't think it was quite at that doom and gloom point yet. There are still ways to make a good career out of it, but they are becoming more elusive every year. Accounting, engineering, and computer science are probably the most ideal careers right now for the average student.

EDIT: Re-read it and just wanted to add that professional school loans are unsubsidized at 6.8% and for some up to 7.9%. That's how a lot of med students taking full loans to go to pricey school are getting whammed to the 350/400 point, because the interest accrues starting immediately. Is that what's happening to your friend? 250K at 6.8% would already lead to ~325K, 300K at 6.8% -> 390K at graduation, 350K -> 455K at graduation. Then at residency it's not like you can really even handle the interest on those. It's nasty.

USMCFLYR

northwestdc10 -

I see that you are new to the forums.
One thing for certain on APC is that FACTS are NOT necessary in these forums.

The fact that you have current experience in the search for medical school counts for nothing. The fact that someone in Hoss' story might be on the outlying fringe of higher debt makes that person's situation the norm. The fact the Hoss heard this from someone makes it more truthful than anything that you might have personally experienced yourself and certainly more truthful than any studies.

Well that sounds familiar.

This post hasn't even scratched the surface of doom and gloom yet!

northwestdc10 - you will have missed some of the sarcasm in my post above and will think me crazy after reading my first paragraph, but the more you read these threads if you stick around APC you might begin to see the method to the madness.

Good luck in the search for the Med school path.
If you also have that love of aviation - being a military flight surgeon is one path to combining both with many of the aforementioned benefits.

USMCFLYR

SkyHigh

Here is a USA today article on jobs that do not require a four year degree and pay over 100K.

No college degree required for these $100,000 jobs

It is shocking how little doctors and airline pilots make and how much other simple sounding jobs can earn. Personally I believe that if a job sounds fun, satisfying or glamorous at all there will be huge competition.

Become a handyman in San Francisco and you can top 100K. In my current profession I get to survey many credit reports and personal information and there are a lot of high paying jobs out there that you would not know of. I had one the other day from a guy who works in the sanitation department of a small town near Seattle who made 115K. He was not a manager or anything either.

Skyhigh

rickair7777

Nuclear plant reactor operators explains this...for every one of them there are dozens of lower-paid supporting staff. Getting a civilian RO job without an engineering or physics degree would essentially require navy nuclear power training and experience...that's 8 years of hell that puts any college degree to shame. You'd be competeing for the job with my former commanding officer: Navy O-5 with shipboard nuclear engineering experience and a master's degree.



That's because a) there is a shortage of shall we say red-blooded male blue-collar workers and b) Cost of living is sky-high. That $100K plumber lives the same livestyle as a $35K plumber in Witchita.

northwestdc10

Yeah, been a lurker on the site for over a year and I'm familiar with the bs or exaggerations that get spread around sometimes. I only chose to comment on Hoss' post because it's an extreme example and only allows uninformed people to think that every doctor in the nation is going to be 500K in the hole. It's one of those careers now that requires you to really plan ahead - better to take time off after school and do other things with your life until you can get into affordable medical school (still a great career if one can do that - great pay stability, flexibility - all of which is greatly diminished with giant debt), or never go at all. 500K is ridiculous and unrecoverable. I think same goes for smaller levels of debt too. I still can't believe BenS is alright with 80K debt, and I think he's at Great Lakes. I don't know the guy but it still makes me anxious. Hope it works out.

That said, Hoss is actually one of my favorite posters who tends to have good information to share. I always enjoy reading about his story at UAL and I've read some good stuff from him before about medicine & aviation.

However USMCFLYR, you'll be disappointed to know I'm a HUGE SkyHigh fan. And apparently you are the owner of a flight school!

USMCFLYR

So am I - APC would be much more boring without such posts to read. Many on here can agree with the message, but have troubles with the belittling presentation. I guess I had better go get my CFI so I can get to work then because I am certanly no businessman!

USMCFLYR

Cubdriver

USMC flies for the biggest flight school in the world, the almighty FAA.

USMCFLYR

Well I didn't think of it that way
In any case - I'm the smallest fish in the ocean; so obviously NOT the owner as some would contend. It is telling though when that is the best insult someone can come up with - that or being called management.

USMCFLYR

SkyHigh

I agree. Still however airline pilots also live in San Francisco in the same neighborhoods along with handymen, grocery store clerks and mailmen.

Even the best airline wages are falling within striking distance of some very common jobs that do not require nearly as much luck, training or education.

Skyhigh