To tell you that a newly qualified doctor only earns £29k?

[Drstrike]

Doctors now leave medical school after 5/6 gruelling years of study - with £85k of student debt.

First year post-qualification is £29k, rising to £33k the following year. Then things stagnate around £40k whilst in specialty training.

The first year post-qualification is more supervised. But you are still the first doctor to be bleeped if one of your ward patients starts bleeding post-op, falls and hits their head, has chest pain etc. and you are the one to initiate management then contact your consultant to let them know. You are still covering wards overnight with seniors at a distance. You are still prescribing medications, ordering scans involving radiation, explaining plans to patients and families. You are still a fully qualified doctor - just not with full registration.

This salary is based on a 40-48 hour full time week depending on rota. That means you can be "part time" working 40hrs a week in a job like surgery.

It takes 5/6 years of medical school, 2 years of foundation training, 3 years of core training and 3 years of higher specialty training to become a consultant. That's a commitment of 13 years, generally from the age of 18.

During this time doctors have to pay for their own progression exams (£500-£1000 each).

There are out of hours premia for nights/weekends on top, but in specialties like psychiatry and GP only basic is earnt.

Does this shock you?

What and other people don't, give your own head a shake you loon and try reading the entire thread before you comment next time.

Thank god young people still want to train to be doctors.🙏
Or teachers, nurses etc and all other who all.contribute to a civilised society.

If doctors incur a debt of £85k to train, but the cost of a doctor's training is actually over £200k to the country, then it's quite straightforward surely to suggest that anyone training via a UK medical school/university at public expense should need to deliver £115,000 in worked hours before they can swan off to another country with the skills that were paid to be developed here. Education is currency now.

Thank you, @CinnamonSwirlGirl

Given that so many doctors end up earning huge amounts doing private work after their allotted NHS work , I'm not too horrified.

Consultants earn between £80k and £120k on average, in the NHS. But you start low and keep progressing as your experience and training increases.

@RotundBeagle I agree that people in a whole lot of hard, potentially dangerous jobs should have better pay and better working conditions. When those people strike or otherwise call for action or support, I support them to do so.

Dividing people and pitting us against each other (like healthcare vs refuse collection vs teaching, etc) just makes us all weaker in our own increasingly small groups, and less likely to achieve change. The resources to make a real difference to the lives of people around the country are being hoarded by the few while the many struggle. We may struggle in different ways, but we shouldn't dismiss each others' struggles; we should stand together. Only thinking of our own worries and ignoring when others ask for help, or even just a simple lack of kicking us more while we're down, means nothing gets any better and we're all left in this mess.

@EffortlessDesmond you’re being ridiculous or live in the wrong country. I’m sure some authoritarian regime would love your idea. Hey, pitch it to Braverman, it’s at about her level.

I’m shocked at that.
its ridiculously low, and the salary progression isn’t fast or high enough. With the level of responsibility I don’t think the salary is fair.
I say this know what my industry pays. A junior developer (who has only done a bootstrap course for 5 months) joins us on 25k. In a year they will be on 35k. I pay my apprentices 22k while they are on their course, increasing to 25k when they start to work. They will be on 35k within a year.
FWIW I’m not a very good paying employer. I know this, I’ve got external benchmarking data done by a 3rd party.

If you do not look after the junior doctors, providing them with safe working conditions and decent pay, you will not have enough consultants in the future!

Quite

Medics are the profession that everyone knows ends up with massive pension. You start at 23 on the UK average salary but it goes up very quickly. I feel much more sorry for the people in private sector jobs that will never earn £29K and have shit pensions. Also, I spent longer in university getting more degrees but earn less than a medic despite being a real doctor and working in the industry that invented the vaccines, antibiotics and drugs that enable medics to save lives. So, no, don't give a fuck that a fresh out of uni 23 year medic earns £29Kpa.

I actually agree with this and would be happy for it to be applied across a range of degrees.

For me, it's not the doctors pay that's the problem. Many doctors are on record saying that no amount of money could make working in the NHS endurable. And the starting pay is a red herring because you have to consider overall pay and pension. Plus doctors in this country have got a first class education at an unbelievably low price relative to what they'd pay elsewhere - you may earn better elsewhere but unless you're a fortunate migrant from the UK, a much larger proportion of that higher starting salary is going to fund your student debt. And we have to remember that we probably need to fix nurses and paramedics pay before doctors if we're talking about who has to use food banks and the need to earn a living wage.

So my feeling is let's listen to doctors telling us that they hate treating patients who are dying unnecessarily and give them better working conditions. This will not be achieved by raising the salary because doctors are emigrating due to ill health and job dissatisfaction not poverty. It will be achieved by funding the NHS properly, making it possible for GPs to survive emotionally on full time hours and training a decent number of medics.

This.

I have a three bed semi and if you want it in my area, or reasonably close, you’re going to have to pay me £350,000 for it. My sibling has a two bed semi and hers would fetch £270,000 minimum as it needs a little work.
You could perhaps get a garage for £50,000 though.

To get somewhere for £50,000 my son would have to move away, probably up north. Fine, that’s possible, but he’d be a long way from family and friends.

I understand that but I am comparing the sort of equivalent candidates. All the ones I know who have siblings who are medical or are married to doctors are very successful and on very high salaries.
I'm not suggesting that doctors should have equivalent pay btw but it is the case that the top students who go into medicine could be earning far more in different professions.

'Given that so many doctors end up earning huge amounts doing private work after their allotted NHS work , I'm not too horrified.'
That's not actually correct @GlassBunion. It's a very small percentage of Consultants who earn 'huge amounts'. They are mainly based in London. Lots do no private work.

@Florenz 'But doctors are paid more than bin men. A junior doctor is paid more than an experienced bin man. An experienced doctor is paid much more than an experienced bin man. Doctors think they should be paid much more, from day one, than an experienced manual worker. That's the problem as I see it.'

Imo the doctors deserve to be paid more than bin men because of their minimum 5 or 6 years of education in one of the most competitive Uni courses and the level of skill required to do the job. As doctors progress, they take on increasing levels of responsibility and develop very high levels of skill eg performing emergency surgery, resuscitating children. There isn't the same expectation on a bin man that he will continue to develop skills and responsibilities. It is a very different job, essential and worth of respect but very different.

But they are paid more than bin men.

I know. I thought you were arguing that that is unfair. Have I misunderstood?

Rubbish again. NHS pension has been very much eroded. They also pay HUGE amount into it. Far mor than any private pension. Its not sodding free money.

@Iwannabeacrocodilehunter if your son and young people now days are complaining that they cannot afford a 2-3 bedroom semi detached house for their first home. Then they are seriously detached from reality.

What the hell is wrong with a 1/2 bed terrace or flat. Not good enough for them?

It's not free money but it is really really unfair to compare wages without factoring the pension into it. Any financial advisor will tell you that wages are misleading if it's all you're using to evaluate wealth. Don't be insulting and rude when pensions are mentioned - it's not nitpicking or being contrary, it's pertinent if you're going to talk about salary at all.

And it's far more than any private pension because private pensions don't come close!

It's no longer just upfront. The new contract means that the days cheap labour now but rewards later in your career is over.

I find this quite an odd thread when doctors can pick up locum shifts at exorbitant rates at a relatively early stage. This is not open to bin men, paramedics or any other profession I can't think of.