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

But Labour have said they won’t be looking at agreeing to anywhere near a 35% increase…they want root and branch reform of the NHS.

Just shows what an important job they do. Do you think if MPs didn't work for a few days, loads of people would die?

12% offer combined over a year is not refusal though?

No, they probably didn't. You don't even know how much you'll be earning in the next six months, or where you'll be working, due to the rotational nature of training.

When the poster chose their career at age 16-18, I suspect they weren't financially savvy, nor understood how years of below inflation pay progression would impact on their finances many years later. They possibly also didn't anticipate the rises in uni fees and cost of living, because they were for all intents and purposes children when making those life-changing decisions.

And while their salary may be higher than many, it also is for more hours, and much more responsibility than almost any other sector with the same level of qualification. Those longer hours also mean that 'standard' childcare like childminders and nurseries don't work, because they're simply not available at the right time, meaning nannies, and more cost.

The poster also rightly points out that costs are ongoing. Postgraduate exams are hugely expensive and mandatory to progress. You require certain courses which are not fully funded to progress. You require indemnity despite working for the NHS, just in case something goes wrong and you are sold up the river by the least supportive employers around.

I fully support all NHS staff to strike, as the entire system has been run on goodwill for too long.

some of these problems are of your own doing OP.
You chose to have a child - did you not consider things like childcare costs / provision / stable relationship / family support etc beforehand?
You chose to live where you live - I don't believe its impossible to relocate.

It shows they are playing Russian roulette with patients lives.

I find it very hard to believe that people go into nursing and being doctors without knowing it is poorly paid. You'd have to have been living under a rock not to know that. Yet people still keep going into the profession then complaining at how poorly paid it is and striking. Could it be possible those people may be part of the problem here? You knew before you went into the profession how poorly paid it was. Why go into it if you already knew how poorly paid it was? What is the point of going into something you know isn't going to pay you well then complaining you can't make ends meet and going on endless strikes? Anyone else unable to make ends meet would have to find a better paying job elsewhere. Do you think the people with cancer who can't have their treatment as a result of your strikes are all talking about how marvelous the strikes are? Or do you think they might be wondering why on earth you went into a job you already knew wasn't well paid just so you can go on endless strikes inconveniencing other people? It baffles me. Get a better paid job if this one isn't providing the lifestyle you already knew it was never going to give you anyway, or stop complaining about it.

So our well paid government who get lots of extra money from their side projects they give business to have thankless jobs, but doctors should just suck it up and work in terrible conditions for not enough money?

Please, tell us your logic for this one.

The 35% increase isn't meant to be in one go and I'm sure they will accept less.

It was my Mum, there was simply no experienced Doctors on duty when she had her stroke, one was eventually found 36 hours later, by which time the damage was done and she died 3 months later.

This was nothing to do with strikes (long before) the NHS has simply been under funded for decades, even Blair only bought us up to the EU12 average.

Its why the UK has so few beds, scanners, Doctors and Nurses per head of population, its why our cancer survival rates are so low compared to much of Europe.

Its why i believe we need to value the NHS and pay its staff properly, economically, we simply cannot afford not too.

In Scotland they've offered that. In England the government won't even go to the table.

I think you will find drs earn way more than MPs.

@Newchapterbeckons they do. You are talking bollocks, as you have an agenda of discouraging support for them.

No see pp they’ve already had 9% this year plus extra 3

I’ll quote it again

Here

Later on in their careers yes. But they also likely don't have side hustles that can be given lucrative contracts to put extra in their pockets.

See the PPE scandal. And any other major contract. Or even what Rishi's Mrs does.

JD don't earn anywhere near as much.

I am sorry about your mum, but we can’t service 70 million users on a free health service from birth to a 100 years old. Statistically it’s impossible.
At some point someone is going to have to be honest with the public.

The nhs was not designed to do what is now expected of it. I don’t know how we have staggered on for as long as we have.

I do feel junior drs should get more like 18 - 24 gbp per hr

Starting pay for a new and inexperienced MP, learning the ropes, is £86.5k pa plus an extremely generous expenses package and a final salary pension.

An newly qualified JD gets under 30k ?

So your ingenious suggestion for a solution is that every doctor should get pissed off and go off and do something that pays better? Could you maybe stretch your mind to think what the implications of that might be? Clue - maybe no doctors left?

@IpsyUpsyDaisyDoos do you think 12% in one year is reasonable?

@Newchapterbeckons I assume you realise that the doctors are asking for a £5 an hour pay rise. From £15 to £20 an hour. Because 25% of shit pay is not a lot.
Most doctors earn under £63,000 a year. Because the vast majority are not consultants (who mostly do not want £100,000).
Not sure if you've heard of Google ? It's a useful tool to stop you looking like, well a tool.

Hadn't seen that one, was busy not being on MN for a bit, I'll have a look thanks.

You and me. They are now on 15 ph. When I did quick maths ( I am fair) I also thought 18 to around 22 per hour is fair.

Some barristers get £30 for a hearing. Meaning their travel to and from the court is paid for by the barrister him/herself.