Struggling to make ends meet as a junior doctor. AIBU?

[HK3444]

Struggling to make ends meet. Rent has gone up, food bills are going up and struggling to support my kids.

I’m someone worked really hard through medical school, it felt like endless exams and accumulated student debt with the hope that I’d be able to support my family comfortably at the end of the degree and but also feel job satisfaction bettering the health of others.

Not sure what this was all for… can’t believe I’m in this situation as a doctor

I feel no one is reading previous posts.

@BobnLen I started my training 25 years ago and I had to choose my a levels and thus have an idea of my career path a couple of years before that. At that point, doctors could live comfortably. They now cannot.

This is what pay restoration is about

So the government says. They find money to give to Michelle Mone and others though. "We can't afford it" so the cost is our health. Don't be blinkered by government iterations. They all have private care and will never have an 11 hour wait in A&E.

Bankers have uncapped bonuses because they are working for private companies!! Making millions.

YOU are working and being paid by the public purse. Of course the two are not comparable!

For fucks sake how can you not know this?

Get a job at Goldmans. If you desperately hanker after rockstar money, then medicine is not for you. Simple.

As a health professional my comment would be. Yes by all means get paid more but don’t work NHS and private at the same time. Have NHS salaried GP’s but don’t have GP’s businesses - I don’t think the model for GP’s works to the benefit of patients any more. Have consultants who are on site and on shift, and deliver care supporting the junior doctors.
I am not that supportive of these strikes really. Doctors want to have their cake and eat it and don’t seem to care that real people are suffering whilst they hold the country to ransom.

@Newchapterbeckons.

i quoted your exact words.

I don’t know what you mean by niche but we are a very needed and very busy specialty.

There are lots of specialities like this:

General paediatrics is a huge, female heavy specialty. Almost no private work.

Not niche.

and frankly, we cannot be basing our doctors’ salaries on their future ability to possibly earn outside the NHS. How does that help retention?

No they are turning the public against themselves by demanding ridiculous amounts of money. The only people being punished by these strikes are the thousands of patients who have had procedures cancelled and the quality of care they receive effected.

You think the private healthcare tories give a shit? The strikes just give them more excuses to sell off the NHS. More evidence the NHS is failing. It's just so frustrating that once again the general public take the brunt of it all.

Does anyone really think that the junior doctors want to strike? They are doing it because they see no other choice. Not for time off work.

And all of those people criticising them are playing into our current government's hands. Get the public to constantly criticise the NHS, so services can be slowly but surely privatised. And then in 5 or 10 years wake up and wonder why they need private insurance for a hernia operation.

I would rather myself and my loved ones were given medical treatment from someone on a decent rate of pay who has fewer financial worries than a worker stressing about how they are going to feed their family.

@BobnLen Have you actually read the thread? Your questions have been answered.

At what age do you think a doctor should get a decent salary then and how much do you think they’re worth?🤔

When you look at how pay has been eroded over the last few years, it's not as ridiculous as it sounds.

The bottom line is the that the NHS model is collapsing anyway, and the ridiculous 35% pay demand and doctors striking in the middle of winter is just going to fast track its demise.

The ransom demand is totally, totally unaffordable and you have lost public confidence and support. Slow clap for you. Not cool.

Yes it is ridiculous.

Maybe you could point to where the OP says how long they have been a doctor, the thread is about them, maybe I missed it but I can only see 3 posts

Junior doctors are hardly paid rockstar money! You sound really out of touch with salaries.

IF that were really true the junior doctors would be negotiating in a realistic and responsible, reasonable manner.

The demand of 35% is entirely unrealistic and they know it, so I am not sure this is about money. It’s about politics, it must be, as no reasonable person of average intelligence would continue with the 35% pay demand as their hard line.

Ummm that is the point. Do try and keep up.

You will feel differently if you ever have to use the NHS. All the young doctors who are actually working in the NHS are telling you the current situation is untenable but you (from your replies I don't think you or anyone you know has ever worked in the NHS) seem to know better. When all the UK trained doctors are abroad and we're scrambling for care, restoring pay is going to look like the better option. The British public seem comfortable with the financial sector and government wasting and mismanaging taxpayers' money but not too bothered about doctors being paid properly.

Maybe look at another career, working in the public sector is obviously not for you

@Missingmyusername: valiant effort but@BobnLen doesn’t want to read the thread.

Apparently this is an AIBU where it’s U because no one ever waited 2 decades of training to be able to afford to actually go to work, despite plenty of evidence to the contrary on the same thread.

if OP says they have been working 5 or 10 years then clearly they should just suck it up since they will soon be rolling in it, according to lots on here… 🤦🏼‍♀️

Do you even acknowledge your incredible privilege and education?

OP may have only been working a year, they haven't said, just mentioned young children, how do we know they have worked 5 or 10 years, maybe @HK3444 will come back and tell us

@C0untDucku1a £14.50 an hour approx after Years of training. Are you wondering why you can't get a GP appointment. It will get worse as people won't want to train given the conditions and pay. The general public haven't got a clue!

That they paid for.

@Angelsrose I'm a nurse, the rest of the NHS settled for a lot less than 35%

That's really of little importance if you cannot make ends meet and that is what the op is trying to tell you but you know better. It sounds like you may be envious of a "Doc Martin" type character from the 1950s who lived in the biggest house in the village. That is not the current NHS doctor or the current remuneration. What do you think the possible motivation could be for so many UK trained doctors moving abroad to work. Why do you think so many people are leaving the NHS? Have a think about it.

Newchapterbeckons are you like this in real life or just on anonymous forums?