I went to the pharmacist the other day to buy some viagra(because I'm an old man) and she rang me up, "that will be 551". me: "551 dollars! wow drugs are really that expensive" pharmacist: " 5 dollars and 51 cents..." me: "oh" and the sad part was I wasn't trying to be funny.
That's because physicians are required -- in most if not all states -- to go through a 'residency' period (roughly three years long). Pharmacists, on the other hand, aren't required to do so, but do have the option of doing a one-year residency that would increase their income-earning potential and make them more attractive to potential employers. Still, physicians make more money than pharmacists following their residency...a physician can easily make two or three times more than what a pharmacist makes.
That's where the confusion seems to be: the people who 'ring you up' at your neighborhood pharmacy are seldom, if ever, "pharmacists". Those are pharmacy technicians, you don't even need a bachelor's degree for that. That's probably why a lot of people have such a low opinion of pharmacists, they think that they're the cashier at their local pharmacy.
My girlfriends sister is in pharmacy school and will be done soon. I have about 5 friends i can name that are close and they are all pharmacists. They make great money. 1 friend got recruited from Walgreens to go to Kroger and they are paying well into 6 figures. The other close friend i had got a job offer to fly to mcallen texas for months at a time and they basically pay him double pay to be out there so he is raking in anywhere from 20 - 30 K a month being out there which is just rediculous. He works long hours but for that kind of pay it's amazing. Not including they pay for all airfare and housing over there. The thing is that Pharmacist have one of the highest demands right now. They get scooped up right out of school and given fat signing bonuses to work for companies becuase there is a shortage. It will be that way for a long time. It's definently not an easy road to become a pharmacist. I have seen first hand. but the pay off is nice if you can make it through. Just like any job you get paid for your knoweldge not how easy the work is after you have obtained that knowledge. If i didn't spend all these years in computers gaining the knowledge i couldn't charge people money to do the work. My time and knowledge is money, if not everyone would fix there computers, build website and things like that. They spend 4 years to learn things and get paid for it.
Most pharmacists graduating nowadays are of the PharmD type which means you do call them Doctor. I have 3 cousins who graduated from TSU within the last 3 years. None of them got offered more than $100k from Walgreens/CVS/Krogers starting. But they are making roughly $85-90k. I hope you mean they don't get paid that much right after med school because they have to go through residency. Because after residency they bank it pretty well. I have two brothers who are both finishing residency and fellowship, respectively. They are getting offers of $150-180 with $50k bonus and loan paybacks. This is only guaranteed salary. Meaning if they have a lot of patients and make more money then they make more. But usually starting out you don't have patients so they guarantee you a salary for 2-3 years while you build up your practice.
He graduated from University of Houston back in 1969. It was a five year program to get a degree back then. They have increased the time it takes to get a degree now. He does do continuing education to remain licensed in Texas. There used to be only three places to get a pharmacy degree in Texas: UT, UH and TSU. I knew Tech added a program. Is there a fifth now? He filled a prescription for Craig Biggio's son yesterday. He was the only person that noticed that Craig Biggio was in the store. None of the other employees recognized him.
Business school graduates that go into management consulting make over $100K. Business school is only 2 years, does not require a certification, and you don't really have to know anything.
What I have been told was ... 6 year program (and you don't get a bacelor's degree) starting salaries are near 6 figures and going up since by 2010 Walgreens will be hiring EVERY pharmasist that graduates Something has to give.
I agree that cost of living association with your region has to be a big factor, but I have a client who is a pharmacist and after 3 years with one of the major chains was pulling down about $80,000/year. She's in Winston-Salem, NC.
I have a relative who has been a pharmacist for years and also has owned several pharmacys here in Houston. The pay has been great for him but it takes a lot of work to get here. He is a millionaire now and has been through the ups and downs (medicaid laws and pharmacy chains) of owning his own. Im very proud of him. Stop hating thread starter.
There are usually two roads for pharmacists to take. Some can become retail and some can become hospital pharmacists. In retail, most pharmacists fill prescriptions, check interactions, manage pharmacy techs...pretty much manage and run the whole pharmacy. I think the pay avg's listed are accurate. In hospital, pharmacists double check all orders, check interactions, mix meds, answer q's from docs, take overnight call ...etc I'm not sure what the pay increase is, but I know the hours are worse and it is probably slightly more stressful. Physicians are paid differently. First there is college and then med school (4 years). Following medical school, there is residency and fellowship (optional). Residency is any where from 3 years (for primary care) to 7 years (neurosurgery). Fellowship following residency usually lasts 1-5 years depending on specialty. Residency and fellowship salaries are fixed and start at approximately 37,000-42,000 (and increase per year of service by about 500-1000 a year). Here's the crappy part. Residency is regulated that a physician cannot work more than 80 hours per week and more than 30 per shift. These rules are broken all the time. Surgeons routinely spend 100 hours/week in the hospital, and it is not unusual for a shift to last 35 hours or so. If you calculate it out, that means that the hourly pay in residency/fellowship is around ~10 dollars per hour. This is why physicians "start" at 150,000-300,000 following residency; b/c after 7-15 years of "training" they are finally being compensated a decent salary.
I used to work for Eckard Drugs. Pharmasists have the knowlege of the doctor, but they just dipense the drugs. They can give the same advise that a doctor gives. However, they work in "stores".
Pharmasists have to know why you are taking a certain medication. They don't just say "hey, this doctor prescibed this drug and that's what I'll give the patient!" They have to know EVERYTHING about the conditions of the patient and the interactions of the drug. These people went through YEARS of school to become "Walgreens employees".
na she was the pharmacist. She was the asian lady, the technicians have to wear a different uniform thingy. I guess I should be angry that the Ceo didn't personally come down to serve me, since I am the most important person ever.
do you know how difficult it is to decipher a doctor's handwriting? they have to go to at least a year's worth of school for handwriting analysis.
Hence "straight out of medical school" in my post. My father is an anesthesiologist, so I've been around the medical field all my life and seen what established physicians can make. But right after eight years of post-secondary schooling, it isn't $100K. Which is the only point I was trying to make. Nurses do it all the time with only two years of schooling. I remember when my Dad used to leave me notes. Invariably, there'd be some words I'd have to call and ask him about. That's not anywhere near the average salary for MBA grads, though, straight out of college. But I agree a person doesn't necessarily know anything with a graduate degree in business. I have a MS in Marketing, and I don't feel like I learned anything new in my graduate program. I can see Pharmacists being highly sought after right now and over the next several years, though. With the aging of the population and the rapid expansion of the retail pharmacy chains, somebody has to fill those positions. And a lot of medical professions are in high demand with pay that's increasing. My ex-wife is an X-Ray tech, and she makes good money, especially considering she only had to do two years of college. All this talk of how much pharmacists make made me go look at my uncle's house in Southern California on that Google satellite images thingy. It looks like he's doing pretty well for himself... if that sort of thing can be judged from space (I've not actually met this uncle in person, so I've not had a chance to see his house up close in real life).
i work in a pharmacy (im a tech) and a pharmacist's job is relatively easy. however, not everyone can do it. you have to be very knowledgeable and keep up with the field. like someone said earlier -- pharmacists are in HIGH HIGH demand. the job can be really stressful. the pharmacists in our store sometiems work 13 hour shifts and they dont even get 30 minutes to sit down and eat lunch.
