[Closed] How much do you think junior doctors get paid?

Not read all 4 pages but the simple answer is no where near enough
Especially when you compare to certain other professions

Whats the mode though, gives a much more realistic picture.

How do you figure that?
If I have a selection of eleven people and they are on: 5k, 27k, 28k, 30k, 29k, 42k, 19k, 100k, 41k, 5k, 60k then the Mode would be 5k. How is that more representative?

Anyway that ONS link has all the source data tables if you fancy dicking about in Excel.

I agree with Tom above, I work in finance and get considerably more than a fully trained doctor (if the stats on this thread are to be believed) and I didn't even go to university; and I am much less stressed.

@Poah

I'm sure you know as well as I do that whilst that may be the official university payscale there's a heck of a lot of experienced postdocs, PhD's, graduates and experienced graduates being paid at band 4 level (17K-20K) because there is a massive over supply of scientists at these levels and the only jobs they can get are being advertised at HNC/HND level but the universities know they will be employing graduates and better when they create the job advert. (Certainly true in life sciences)

Not enough - should become vets

Don't like it don't do it no one holds gun to your head FFS

Would it make you feel better if they were poor?

I wouldn't say it was underpaid, it's still more than engineering and thats so complicated ive given up explaining to people what it is i do :-p

As for hours, depending on the company ive had friends on anything from 35-60 hour weeks.

Risk of being sent to a hospital 100 miles away? How about egypt, iraq, Saudi, emirates, Kazakhstan, india, nw australia, korea, Thailand and singapore on conditions ranging from excelent to take or your fired?

Yup Rob, I'm just going to do my CFA and jack this science crap in. Balls to it, I'm just going to join the enemy.

Masters in something mathsy and a CFA should do it. No more staring at HPLC instruments for less than 10 an hour, yay.

Is it cheating if you are sys admin for the financial system in a mid sized hospital?

Not enough - should become vets

Not really.
French hospital medicine is rather good. Unless you are in Paris in August.
French general practice is weird, poorly paid in many places, and prescribes stuff the rest of Europe stopped using 40 years ago.

All systems have their problems. Ours is mainly a combination of entrenched inefficiency and high-handedness by some managers and consultants, and continuing political meddling.

Might start higher as a vet but don't go as high as Consultants etc Most of those 20+ will be partners owning their own business like GPs. Take into consideration lack of public sector pension and the gap probably narrows more at the start and grows at the top end.

SPVS salary survey 2014. Industry standard benchmarking.

Fat cats of the feline variety may be on the rise but the same cannot be said of the vets who treat them. The 2014 SPVS Salaries Survey is published today and reveals that, while most vets have experienced very little salary increase on last year, those in the 10 years qualified category have actually lost out with a median 9.2% drop in salary.

Total salary packages varied from £31,150 for newly qualified vets (up 0.5% on last year) to £69,021 for vets qualified for more than 20 years, who were one of the few winners with a double digit increase of 11.9%. This is in marked contrast to the majority of ‘years qualified’ categories that experienced negative growth. The variation in salary increases was less dramatic in terms of hourly rates, which ranged from £16.30 for new graduates to £34.61 for the most experienced vets.

Bloody high rate of killing yourself too.

Centre for Suicide Research | Research | Suicide in high risk occupations |

Suicide in high risk occupational groups - farmers, doctors, female nurses, veterinary surgeons

Several occupational groups in the United Kingdom appear to have considerably elevated risk of suicide. These include, for example, farmers, doctors (especially females), dentists, pharmacists, veterinary surgeons, and female nurses. We have conducted separate research investigations of suicide in farmers, doctors and female nurses in England and Wales. The three studies have each included psychological autopsy investigations (see Hawton, Appleby, Platt et al. (1998) below for a description of this approach). All these projects were commissioned and funded by the Department of Health. We are currently conducting research on suicide in veterinary surgeons.

I’ve mentally written this over and over; I’ve never been a very good writer and suspect this will poorly reflect my intended eloquence but here goes.

I feel completely powerless with respect to my professional future. By this I don’t mean with respect to my patient care, personal educational development or actual maintenance of a job, rather I mean that the future of my profession is increasingly bleak in the UK. Sadly the government has decided to contractually alter doctors conditions within the NHS so as to render it difficult to see a reasonable future employment model. The details of their plan are crystalising and I just cannot understand how anyone would make a rational decision to enter the profession any more. Trainees have already been clinically disempowered and are now being financially penalised. Those currently in training will have their consultant conditions radically altered – to their detriment and there seems to be a growing trend towards well paid physicians assistants at the cost of doctors. Who, I wonder, will hold the medical liability for their role? Consultants currently in contracts will soon, I fear, have them altered.

I see tweets and Facebook posts and although I now write one, I have no expectation that they will make any difference. The government is intent on their plan, the public seem poorly informed and there is almost no ‘industrial action’ that can be taken. How can a doctor strike? It feels morally wrong and would hand a massive ‘PR victory’ to the government. You could almost see the headlines now – ‘Doctors abandon patient care for the Golf Course’… some canards never die and you can bet the entire spin machine of Westminster will ensure they don't. Mass emigration or resignation – sounds great but we all know that will never happen. On the whole we have children in schools, partners in jobs, family responsibilities and more that would make moving, resigning or emigrating difficult to say the least. Again, the government knows this and will use this lever to bludgeon what they want thorough Parliament in the knowledge that there is little effective route to opposition. I’m led to believe that in Australia doctors engaged in a modified strike in that they refused to sign birth and death certificates resulting in significant disruption to daily life and that seems a potential approach – should we be able to engage in action in a united fashion? Would it achieve anything tangible?

I think it’s pretty clear that the endgame here is the restructuring of the NHS and I suspect the end model will be some sort of medical provision with the NHS acting as a smart purchaser of care from a range of chambers. I suspect that altering the doctors’ contracts so harshly is intended to force us to set up companies to provide these chambers and equally wonder if the whole idea of punishing trainees so harshly is to equally induce those chambers to train in house? But this leaves huge potential service gaps – acute and emergency care being one. If this is the intent of Westminster why not just say so? Why not treat the population who elected the government in as adults? “Look, UK, we have no money to maintain the NHS in an effective manner – and here is the evidence for this – so here is our vision”. Instead they choose to scaremonger and manipulate. It all seems a bit Orwellian to me – especially in light of the ‘all animals are good but some are better than others’ approach of a politician pay rise while the rest of the public sector remains frozen. How is that even justifiable? It was done with no apparent attempt at public debate under the reasoning that you have to pay more to get quality. Does that mean the NHS, civil service and MOD – to name a few – don’t need to be of quality as they are effectively suffering a real terms pay cut.

So I feel powerless. This attempt at diarising my concerns will never have the readability, publicity or coverage of a Boris Johnson article and I don’t for an instant believe Jeremy Hunt or David Cameron would ever read this and to some extent I wonder if I am just feeding the dying embers of the last whimper of the NHS but in the interest of my own mens sana I had to at least write it.

We live in interesting times.

Another big post. This is an open letter to an MP from one of our medical friends who is facing a 30% pay cut in these changes. It sums up a lot of what has been said:

Dear Mrs. Bruce,

I am writing to you in follow-up to my e-mail of 24th July to which I still look forward to your reply. The situation regarding the government’s treatment of the NHS and the medical profession has moved on since then, and in particular I wish to address the matter of the new junior doctor contract which, as things stand, will apparently be imposed from next August.

As I previously explained, I am an anaesthetic registrar who is due to complete my training in August 2017. I graduated from medical school in 2006 and I have been a ‘junior doctor’ for all this time. The term refers to all doctors in training, from those who have just completed medical school to those who are on the verge of becoming consultants, and as encompasses a wide range of skills and experience.

The new contract will fundamentally alter the way we are paid, in line with recent recommendations from the Review Body on Doctors’ and Dentists’ Remuneration, which have been roundly condemned by the profession itself. I expect it will be publicly sold as a pay rise, as the basic pay will indeed be increasing, but our salaries are significantly impacted by a ‘banding supplement’ to cover out of hours work. For myself this provides 50% on top of basic pay (a fairly standard rate), i.e. one third of my salary. These banding payments are to be abolished and replaced with a much lower supplement that, together with a redefinition of what counts as unsocial hours, means I am facing a pay cut of somewhere between 10-30% of my salary (by current estimates).

The only trainees who will actually experience a pay rise are the few in specialities with little or no out of hours commitment. Those of us who routinely work evenings, nights and weekends (including my beleaguered colleagues in Emergency Medicine) will be hit hardest. GP trainees will also stand to lose a significant chunk of their income – this when a recruitment crisis already exists!

The new contract will also particularly hit those who take parental leave, those who take time away from training to obtain higher qualifications such as a PhD (as expected in several specialities) and those who change specialities, as I did in 2010. At present, my salary reflects the training and experience that I obtained before entering anaesthesia, which continues to be of use to me today. In the future, dropping back to the bottom of the pay scale may be a bar to someone wishing to move to a speciality for which they are better suited.

I am not pleading poverty, but a pay cut of this magnitude is not an appropriate way to treat a group of highly trained, highly skilled individuals doing an important and very responsible job. I know I am not alone in having made financial commitments that I would not have made had I known I was faced with losing potentially almost a third of my income.

Since qualifying, I have seen medical training overhauled, including the debacle that was MTAS/MMC. Along with many others I have moved hundreds of miles, away from family and friends, to continue my training. I have seen accumulation of the correct paperwork seemingly become more important than clinical ability. I have seen changes to our pensions that mean we get to pay more for the privilege of retiring later and receiving less (despite the NHS pension scheme being a net contributor to the economy). For this I get a pay cut.

I have worked well beyond my contracted hours on a regular basis and have been in work for more nights and weekends than I could tell you. I have missed birthdays, weddings and Christmases, neglecting my loved ones in the process. I have gained skills and experience that allow me to work increasingly independently and also to provide training to those junior to me, often in my own time. For this I get a pay cut.

I pay over £1000 annually in professional fees – these are not optional payments and I am not counting membership of the BMA. I have paid over £2000 to sit required postgraduate exams. I am still paying off my student loan. I pay several hundred pounds a year to park at my workplace! For this I get a pay cut.

I have been punched, scratched and bitten in the course of my job (generally by those who aren’t in a position to know better). I have called families in at 5am to explain to them that their loved one is dying. I have played a major role in the saving of many lives. I go to work every day knowing that if I am not on the ball, a patient could come to harm or worse. For this I get a pay cut.

I am not at all unique in any of this. Normally these are not causes for complaint – they are part of the job – but in the present circumstances I feel it is important to describe what the job actually entails. We have listened to one health secretary after another (in particular the present one) tell the public that we are greedy, workshy and to blame for the systemic problems in the NHS, when none of them have shown much sign of understanding our work.

For the first time in my career, I am seriously considering taking my skills and training overseas. I believe in the NHS but these changes show that we, as a workforce, are not valued. I didn’t go into medicine for the money but I do expect my salary to reflect what I have put into my career. I don’t believe that other developed countries treat their medics with the contempt shown to us by the current government. Many of us will leave and find that our lives (in and out of work) are better elsewhere. Nurses and other allied health professionals will quite reasonably wonder if they are next in line for this sort of treatment.

As in my previous e-mail, I implore you to support the workforce of the NHS and oppose this wholesale erosion of our conditions. I have never seen my colleagues as angry as they are now.

Yours sincerely,

Dr. Rachel Smith

If I have a selection of eleven people and they are on: 5k, 27k, 28k, 30k, 29k, 42k, 19k, 100k, 41k, 5k, 60k then the Mode would be 5k. How is that more representative?

Because the country has many more than 11 people in it who work?

Because the country has many more than 11 people in it who work?

I don't really want to get derailed into a discussion about stats, but that still doesn't make Mode a good way of assessing what people earn does it?

For example let's say a very large employer has a structured pay scheme with set remuneration levels. That increases the frequency of those specific salaries and makes them more likely to be the Mode.

e.g. Let's say all Tesco store managers earn exactly £31,637.90 a year. That might be a big enough employer and common enough position to make that figure the most frequent in the survey, so it would be the Mode. But how would that be helpful when we know (from the median) that the majority of established full-time workers are paid four grand less than that?

With respect to median, mode and mean, the comparison is pretty bogus. Doctors do not work median, mode or mean hours, at median, mode or mean times of the day (or night, or week, or year) and don't have median, mode or mean levels of training and education.

... Or responsibility, or rates of stress and suicide.

Thats true but we were discussing the national average wage. The mean is squewed by high earners and median is not representative of what most people earn either. Mode would be better when looking for what people earn on a national level. And thats before we discus the 24k figure only included people who had been in the same job a year ( which would I expect get rid of a lot of lower earners)

PS I think Dr's get a shit deal by the way

Also, because I'm a old school leftie and I think that the real struggle is not between workers but between workers and capitalists, 22k is about the annual return on a buy-to-let costing 200k. Ie you'd be paid the same amount as a junior doc earns by simply owning a mid-sized terrace house in the north of England and sitting on your arse all day long. Source: http://www.moneyobserver.com/news/28-05-2015/buy-to-let-annual-return-rises-above-111-billion

median is not representative of what most people earn either. Mode would be better when looking for what people earn on a national level

I really don't understand your logic there. If you work full-time and receive a median salary then half of the full-time working population receive less than you and half receive more. That seems like a reasonable definition of "average".

Conversely if you happen to be on the median salary then you just receive an amount that happens to come up frequently for whatever reason. It may be unusually high or unusually low compared to what everyone else gets.

Anyway this is getting well OT. Whatever definition you use a 15-30% pay cut plus possibly additional hours for an already extremely hard working and stretched workforce is a shit deal that seems specifically designed to destroy the NHS by stealth.

Incidentally I've heard rumours that the government are currently trying to block Certificates of Good Standing from being issued to ST3's and lower in the hope that they can prevent a mass exodus of junior doctors to other countries.
Meanwhile we are heavily recruiting doctors and nurses from third-world countries who need them more than us.

Incidentally I've heard rumours...

That would, I think, be the last straw for people thinking about quitting to do something else, just because of the sheer level of disrespect that would demonstrate. I anticipate it will be with us within the month.

It beats me why there are any doctors at all in this country. (If it was all about money)

Australia or the USA would give them a much better deal.

The NHS is brilliant but our politicians' agenda is to monetise it and flog it off to their mates. There is no other logical reason for the way they are trying to destroy it. (Apart from stupidity)

(Apart from stupidity)

Hanlon's Razor:

"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity"

... although in this case it may just be malice.

22k is about the annual return on a buy-to-let costing 200k.

And there are fairies at the bottom of the garden.

It's all f###ed anyway, seriously....we're a top heavy ageing society, unless we all want to pay more tax (election results suggest not) then health care will get worse from an NHS perspective.

Blame ourselves for not having enough children, blame ourselves for having them later in life, blame the elderly for living too long etc etc.....either way it's f###ed.

At my NHS trust our call volume goes up 5-7% each year, does our budget?...haha, good one, of course not, we're being asked to do more with less each year....it's unsustainable.

Did I mention it's f###ed?...

If the electorate in general don't want to pay more tax and couples continue to have just one or two children then society will have to get used to the idea of paying for health care again or at the vert least some kind of topping up system on top of your central taxation.

Anyway, that's the harsh version of what's happening out there, the other view is to see healthcare as a growth industry, society isn't getting any younger and all these oldies need looking after....set up a private care agency, if you're already a nurse, Dr, paramedic etc moonlight in the private sector....hourly rates are enormous, scared rich old people pay a fortune to be looked after....despite what's been happening with the economy in recent years my earnings have steadily crept up by staying in the NHS for my full time 37.5 hours per week and then using the private sector as a medic in the Police Custody setting, or working doing house calls for out of hours providers....the money is out there.

With regard to changing Dr's contracts, yes there is some crappy stuff going on.....but the push to have GPs in particular working nights and weekends again can't come soon enough....A&E departments are stuffed full of people at the weekend who should be seeing their GP but one isn't available so they trot off to hospital instead!

Your best bet for a good retirement is to have about 4 kids and hope one or more of them do well and can help finance your old age!...buy a cheap flat somewhere too and rent that out to supplement your 'pension'....but don't have it in your name or the ba####ds will make you sell it to pay for your shoddy 10min slot of 'care' that social services have allocated you in the morning and evening....I pity anybody with a good life expectancy these days, thankfully the blokes in my family drop dead at 75 from heart attacks, sounds good to the alternative of a nappy and pureed food until I'm 90.

Have a good day folks!

They might not need to go as far as Aus or the US

"The Scottish Government has confirmed it will not impose a contract on its junior doctors. Announcements are awaited from the Northern Ireland and Wales Governments."

-- http://m.bma.org.uk/news-views-analysis/news/2015/september/the-bma-will-fight-any-attempts-to-impose-a-contract

22k is about the annual return on a buy-to-let costing 200k.
And there are fairies at the bottom of the garden.

The source I quoted said returns were roughly 12.4% last year.

22k is about the annual return on a buy-to-let costing 200k

Nope 🙂

The source I quoted said returns were roughly 12.4% last year.

Specialist lender produces report that encourages people to invest in sector that they finance - call me a tad sceptical.

Specialist lender produces report that encourages people to invest in sector that they finance - call me a tad sceptical.

Do you have some alternative figures? (Serious question)

22k is about the annual return on a buy-to-let costing 200k
Nope

The source! The source!

You have to look at it over a long term, one year when they can be capital price spike is wholly unrepresentative of your likely return. [url= http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/investing/buy-to-let/11653653/Buy-to-let-returns-will-fall-by-60pc-in-a-year.html ]This report[/url] does that to an extent and precedes the tax change which will decrease demand further.

EDIT: I would believe a long term average return of 6%, but a good or lucky investor will do better than this - the thing is you only hear the positive stories in the financial press.

will

Speculation

Another source:

http://www.theguardian.com/money/2015/apr/11/buy-to-let-landlords-earn-returns-of-up-to-1400-since-1996

1400% in 20 years is roughly 14% per annum, assuming that it's more-or-less compound.

Look at the graph not the article - much lower returns in most years with negative returns in the crisis.

[img] [/img]

Again judicious choice of dates, take it back 8 year to 1988 and the result would have been very different. There is no doubt the return has been good though and 6% at the moment is pretty good.

EDIT: The other thing about these house price survey I have never found out how they take into account improvement expenditure.

That leaves out rental income, which my original source suggested made up about half of returns.

Phew! I'm glad I managed to stop this thread wandering off topic 😉

The point is that they chose the best starting date possible, take it back a few years and the returns drop because your "in price" is 50% higher - whatever the rent, that has a huge impact on your IRR - that is what I am illustrating, they is no question residential property has been one of if not the best asset class for some time but the average punter has earned a lot less than 10%.

EDIT: I will resist responding from now on - but if you think doctors have know all patients, imagine what it is like for property financiers.

the point is, the junior doctors are getting royally ****ed and the only possible explanation is that jeremy hunt is either a ****, or has more eyes than brain cells.

/edit - please do keep this on topic and go and debate house prices and RIO elsewhere. starting salaries are shit for junior doctors and under the new contract they're not going to be increased as much by banding and they're going to stay shit for a lot longer.

does the swear filter not work for edits? ****. clearly does, must mean that shit isn't swearing.

The other point (well, question) is what is this going to do to the NHS, and does anyone know / realise / care any more?

(also, sorry for bringing up the point about unproductive income)

The Mrs and I can only conclude that JH is actually attempting to screw up the NHS by any means. Then once the system has fallen apart, people are dying waiting to be triaged in A&E and you can't see your GP without a 10-week wait... then he'll increase the pace of privatisation and **** us all over.

The other point (well, question) is what is this going to do to the NHS, and does anyone know / realise / care any more?

Do you mean in the quality of candidates coming through? It has already started to some degree. Historically Dr's have been some of the countries academic elite.

Why would high achievers want to go in to a work environment where their earning potential is very limited, they get continually bashed by media and government, the goal posts keep changing for the worse etc etc.

The government is already reducing the number of trainee posts and the number of consultants, using cheaper alternatives to deliver clinical care. Trouble is the alternatives coming in are Nurse Specialist, who ironically get paid more than doctors, but they have a very limited knowledge base and scope of practice, so patient care will suffer.

Also at the moment Gorvernment has created another problem. By reducing trainee posts, and changing rules on who can come and work in the UK, there are now massive shortfalls of doctors both in hospital land and GP land. Doctors are getting fed up and leaving the country, or increasing numbers are actually leaving full time permanent jobs and becoming locums.

The NHS is now in a position where Locums are costing a fortune, Salaried GP's can earn more than Partners, shifts on not being filled.

If the governemtn acted to retain staff, rather than making it more attractive to do anything other than work directly for the NHS, then a time bomb would not be about to go off.