My payslip as a doctor in Feb 2021 during COVID

[Juniordoc]

See attached image. Yes this is for full-time work with weekends and nights in the currently stretched working conditions that the NHS provides.

This does not include the expenses and sacrifices of a six year medical degree. On top of that, we have to pay out of pocket for our own GMC membership, medical defence union, postgrad exams and revision courses, conferences and courses.

Please get behind us and support the strikes. We are burnout, exhausted and struggling to live

Here are the ‘mega bucks’ consultants pay scales. Talk of £120k earlier, that’s after 19 YEARS as a consultant. Plus university 5 years and junior doctor at least 7 years.

Honestly, move abroad if you want decent pay.

In the words of Michael Gove back in 2016, "Britain has enough of experts". Your skills and expertise will never be rewarded here.

Ok, also not OP but about 5 years in. I take home ~2500/month. I have worked full-time since the day I qualified. By that I mean "40 contracted hours" + antisocial hours (weekends/nights) but in reality I go in at least half hour early each day and leave probably on average an hour late. so thats 7.5hrs/week already. I have also passed all of my postgraduate exams till date first-time. A luxury not all of us have experienced (we are up against other doctors, everyone is of a high standard and working independently yet you cant pass everyone).

I have no kids because DH and I are on opposite sides of the country (also a fellow medic). I wish I had kids. I hope I can one day have kids (know of too many who's fertility declined while prioritising their career and serving the public). I won't know if I will become a statistic too until we try but I do know I am already "geriatric".

If I continue on this trajectory and really I don't want to (I want to start a family, work less than 60 hours or whatever ridiculous hrs I am doing, be able to see my husband and family/friends and not just study 24/7 outside of work particularly now in the run up to another exam).. I digress, if I continue like this then to answer your question in 10-20 years after qualifying I might earn about £3000-3500.

Point is though, a lot of us won't get to that stage. We need to be able to live now. I cant afford to buy a house. I am currently saving for a deposit, as is DH but this is hard when you each live alone despite being married. We are both fedup of flatsharing. This isn't something many want to do in their mid/late 30s.

People banging on about doctors having done their research, should have known what the pay would be etc it's ridiculous

A junior doctor early on tends to rotate every 4 months or so into a new team, new role, new department, you have a vague idea what you'll be earning but will have to wait for a payslip to see for sure

Then each year you'll likely be sent to a new hospital could be fairly local or miles away, you won't know your rota probably until a few weeks before starting

So no idea whether you'll be on nights/long days/on call let alone what you'll actually be earning

It's probably one of the few jobs where a fully qualified professional does not actually know for sure the T&Cs of the job they'll be taking on

Imagine a trainee/junior solicitor or accountant being in that situation...

Oh I wholeheartedly agree, I'm just referring to income tax. But I suspect someone somewhere in power (or many people) has/have crunched numbers re higher corporation tax and concluded that the amount of jobs they provide etc etc etc.
In fact what irks me is the government (tax payer) having to top up the wages of low paid Amazon (etc) workers while the corporations themselves make huge profits. But that's another thread.

It’s 18 months old. How much do we think salaries have gone up on that time? No wonder newly qualified doctors are emigrating in droves. Such a disgusting waste of all that training.

@Dibblydoodahdah sorry, I just don't know what to say 😂 sorry about your social circle? My sympathies, but I'm not a troll just because you know ONE solicitor toiling away at some random firm.

Just pop by Chancery Lane during the 2+ months of court closure and then tell me where everyone – many Senior Counsel, but also senior counsel – is.

Also, just fyi, on solicitors alone – that general list you've Googled in itself doesn't carry much significance without denoting year. Salary progression each year post NQ is massive, plus more and more firms are following on to the US lockstep model.

Secondly and much more saliently, Lawsoc often release much more detailed data – you'll see that it's very much disproportionately skewed. Magic/Silver Circle firms and American firms present in London often offer so much more. Many of their first year NQ salaries are past the 150k and even 200k mark. There're loads of not very well paid "grunt work" solicitors at random firms, but I think med school students are good unis would be in the league to qualify for bigger firms and also specialise in more prestigious (read: lucrative) practice areas.

I support you. It's criminal what the Tories have done to the NHS.

Agreed. Doctors are not paid enough in the UK.

Admittedly this is a position that they're trying to fill in a remote and grotty Northern BC city, but here's a current open posting for an anesthetist in Canada

(Anyone who doesn't want to look it up, it's equivalent to £350k pa.)

I am so shocked that people have such a lack of basic understanding of what a junior doctor actually is. They need to drop the junior part of the title as people seem to think that junior doctors as beginning their training.

I am an accountant for the NHS, not even that high up and take home the same as you. Its absolutely ridiculous. To be the level I'm out I need to be qualified/part qualified and with 3 years relevant experience. It's disgusts me how little we pay for doctors early on in their careers but happy to pay agencies several hundred thousand a year for a locum (that was NHS but realised they could earn more for an agency.) The system is messed up and it really does worry me.

I agree that doctors’ pay is too low, but I don’t agree with strikes that sick people will pay for with their lives.

I wholeheartedly support junior doctors.

A thriving workforce means better outcomes.

Full pay restoration now!

The pay is low, but it seems disingenuous. Once training is complete doctors can make over 100k in the NHS and supplement massively with private practice.

Can you post your current payslip?

Definitely support! I want you to get proper pay restoration it’s a disgrace. I’m a nurse and when working in London I have seen the massive responsibility junior doctors are given at night covering 6-8 wards. The bleep just never stopped. It requires intelligence, dedication and extreme perseverance to become a doctor. Money is how value is assigned in capitalism. It needs to be a valuable career people aspire to.

Shitting hell. Genuinely shocked.

I was paid the same salary in 2007 when I qualified. There in part lies some of the problem. Support all doctors/NHS striking.

It says on the wage slip 40hrs

Yeah think you cross posted with the actual facts - 20 years will get you £100k, not a few years of junior doctoring!

Honestly, doctors are just leaving to work abroad OR to other industries as many of our skills and certainly work ethic is transferrable. What are we going to do when we have no doctors?

The UK/NHS is not appealing for foreign doctors. They came here years ago because the pay was attractive relative to their home country. It is not now. They are stay at home or going to other western countries that pay better. British doctors are making similar moves.

People not supporting the strikes, what is your plan for when you have an emergency? This personally frightens me and I AM a doctor myself.. but if I have a stroke or my heart stops, I have seen the state of our A&E departments. I feel fortunate to be "young" and worried for all of my older relatives. Something needs to change.

At the same time, working like this is miserable and I too want out.

@Juniordoc I am so sorry. So sorry. I have no words. Thank you for everything. I fully support you.

Should medics be getting more upfront and less at consultant level?

I recently had a short term job as NHS Bank admin band 3. My hourly rate was similar to yours - which is absolutely shocking given the difference in necessary qualifications, responsibility etc.
(Just to be clear the hourly rate I got included an uplift for annual leave. But even the hourly rate without that was almost £12). I hope the strikes enable junior doctors to negotiate a decent pay rise.

It's actually more like 45 hours a week. It says additional hours 21, on the payslip for the month.

To those saying 'you knew what you got into'. No we really didnt. When I made this decision it was about 20 years ago. The NHS was not like how it is now. If I knew, I perhaps wouldnt? Who knows.

I dont have children (see rant above) but if I did, I'd make sure they know about the reality of working as a dr in this country. I have spoken to work exp students however. I then feel bad for discouraging them - yet all I have told them is a tame version of reality e.g long antisocial hours, staying late, often long commutes and rotational training etc. This isnt even going into the nature of the job.

This couldnt have been predicted 20 years ago, just like the pandemic wasn't. Colleagues who have kids of an age to decide what to do at university etc, the vast majority are discouraging from a career in medicine and most are succeeding in doing so.