re: Is it worth the loans to become a doctor? Would it be wise to consider the military?

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At what age does an Ortho fellow in sports, TJA's, or hand, etc finish

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All Ortho fellowships are 1 year, so it really doesn't add much. My hope is to do ortho then a fellowship and if that happens I'll be out at 31.

Yeah, I am an exception. I'll finish med school at 25 as one of the youngest people in my class. The average entering medical school student is 24 now.

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A lot of people that go into something like ER can get out at 29 making a nice salary

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ER is where to go right now if you can deal with the pace IMO. If I had it to do over, I'd consider going to med school to be an ER doc instead of what I am now.

Not on call. you come to work, you handle emergencies, you go home. Hours suck though

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Not on call. you come to work, you handle emergencies, you go home. Hours suck though

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And a lot of it isn't emergencies. Lots of people use it as a walk in clinic of sorts.

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The average entering medical school student is 24 now.

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Right, and those are the 'averages' I'm referencing.

Tack on 4yrs for med school, 5-6 for residency, and another for fellowship and you're at 34-35yrs old. Tack on a 4yr military obligation the OP is considering, and you're in your mid-to-late thirties before day 1 of private practice. That was the point. It was simply responsive to a rather caviler "almost guarantee $250k by age 35," earlier post.

Are there exceptions? Sure. E.g., you anticipate finishing MedSchool at 25. I finished at 23. Those are exceptions. Toss in any high dollar field residency in that instance, and indeed the person will likely pull a nice income at age 35, even now.

Do such exceptions validate baldona's "almost guarantee $250k by age 35" though? Does a "guaranteed $250K/yr by 35" generalization accurately reflect reality, given likelihood of concomitant tuition debt accrual?

Granted there are folks who finish a $500K-$600K educational process debt free. They complete residency by 30 or 31 as you hopefully will, and will flourish from there. But the claim was "its stupid, and frankly ignorant" to suppose that such a situation is not "almost guaranteed". In fact, exceptions are what inevitably drive such observations.

On the other end of the spectrum, you are entering a world where Kaiser Pediatricians are salaried at $156,175/yr, yet RNs can start out at $130K/yr in the same organization. How does that equation pair up with the OP's question, or baldona's contentions?

Again, all of this is framed in context of median expectations and in response to the OP, given the current environment.

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Kaiser Pediatricians are salaried at $156,175/y

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This is fricking ridiculous. At some point MDs are just going to stop working or actually organize and get back in charge.

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On the other end of the spectrum, you are entering a world where Kaiser Pediatricians are salaried at $156,175/yr, yet RNs can start out at $130K/yr in the same organization. How does that equation pair up with the OP's question, or baldona's contentions?

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My FIL is a retired well known Ortho and I have multiple close family members in the medical field. I'm not ignorant here.

Yeah some pediatrician pay sucks, but others are great businessman and kill it also.

I never said it was easy or guaranteed. But I'll argue for someone that has the intelligence to get into med school it's still the easiest and best path.

The biggest argument for Doctors is that if they succeeded in Med school they will succeed in any occupation financially, and that statement is simply false. Doctors are one of the few professions where being the best at your occupation generally pays better. Most pay is based off of business acumen only, which is not based off of intelligence but rather a combination of things.

There are plenty of doctors that suck at being a doctor yet do extremely well financially, same idea. There's no easy way to make a buck anymore, the world is a competitive place. I agree you shouldn't go to med school simply for pay and that desire to be a Md should be very important, I just disagree with the sentiment that the income should not be a decent part of the equation. There are plenty of Vets for example that leave school with $150k in loans and without a lot of business accument may never sniff $100k salaries.

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As has been stated several times, this is not to dissuade folks from pursuing medicine. It is to simply explain that in today's environment, the money for comparable candidates and workload is probably better elsewhere.

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This is exactly where I knew you were going and exactly what I disagree with. With all due respect, this is a typical doctor response that no doctor would ever fail at something they were driven toward.

Sure, there's a great chance that someone with the doctor's ability could do well financially. But I completely disagree that the likelihood is anywhere close to being a doctor even in the post obamacare environment.

I have met plenty of doctors that would be absolutely terrible in almost every other field. Extremely drive, book smart, yet completely terrible people person with no business financial sense whatsoever.

Lastly, I'm also not convinced this is the certain future. We are heavily leaning that way, but there are multiple paths for doctors in the future to take in order to be financially successful with or without medicaid/ medicare. Every single field has issues to overcome.

I am not a MD, but if is solely about money, I think the military route would cost you. If you are looking for something other than just money, I would go USAF and become a flight doc. I have had plenty of flight docs in the back seat and they all seem to enjoy it. The hours usually allow them to moonlight on the side as well.

I would check guard and reserve units as well. That may the best of both worlds for you.

Good luck

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Nothing remotely of the sort was stated. Perhaps you could actually take the time to read posts you claim to be responding to.

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So what does this mean then?:

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And I'll counter that those ending up in ultracompetitive STEP>240 fields like plastics, ortho, GU, derm, opthalmology, or ENT would likely end up at the ultra high end of fields outside medicine. If you feel ultra high end success after 10yrs on Wall Street, in Law, Banking, Consulting, etc translates to $250K/yr or less, your exposure is very different than mine.

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How many of those positions are there in the state of Louisiana compared to Doctors that pull in $250k+?

I don't want to argue this anymore. I understand being a doctor and furthermore a wealthy doctor is not easy. But if you have the ability and drive to be one, I still think its the most sure fire way to that range of income.