<p>So I'm having a hard time deciding whether I want to do engineering or pharmacy. Right now, I'm a ffreshmen in a pre-pharmacy program at a state university and I've heard really bad things about the future in pharmacy, like how there's going to be an extreme surplus of pharmacists due to too many pharmacy schools opening up. I've mostly been hearing them on Student Doctor Network Forums | An educational community for students and doctors spanning all the health professions., but when I look on CC, there is nothing mentioned about the surplus. One other thing that interests me other than pharmacy is engineering, perhaps chemical or biomedical, so I'm having a hard time deciding between engineering and pharmacy.
So I'm wondering, will there really be a surplus of pharmacists, to the extent that jobs will be very difficult to find after graduation? What are your thoughts?</p>
<p>It’s a recession. If you google “surplus of engineers” you’ll get tons of results, many of them saying the exact same thing about engineering jobs that the student doctor boards say about pharmacy jobs. For that matter, google “surplus of doctors” or “surplus of nurses” or “surplus of elementary school teachers” and you’ll find at least a few recent articles/message boards discussing unemployment in all of these areas due to surpluses.</p>
<p>The recession means companies have less money to spend. That means lay-offs, cut hours, hiring freezes, etc. That means so-called “surpluses,” even in careers like education, health care, and engineering, which we (as students) have been told for years have tons of jobs for the taking. It doesn’t matter what field you go into, there will always be people running around yelling that the sky is falling and there will be no jobs for anyone soon, at this rate.</p>
<p>The good news? We are (hopefully, provided this doesn’t turn into a double-dip) pulling out of the recession. And the things that made pharmacy a good job prospect before the recession still hold true. Aging baby boomers, more medicated Americans than ever, a shift in the focus of pharmacy… By the time you graduate from pharmacy school, provided you go straight after undergrad, it will be 2018. The recession will, god willing, be a thing of the past.</p>
<p>So, basically, do what you love. Don’t stick with pharmacy if your passion is engineering; don’t switch if your passion is pharmacy. Heck, you’re a college freshman – your ambitions could change completely by the time it’s time to apply to pharmacy school. But don’t run around changing your major every time you hear something bad about job prospects for that particular field. Job prospects for any field aren’t what they were a couple years ago, but in the fields you’re looking at, they’re still better than most, and by the time you hit the job market, they will hopefully be back on track with the outlooks we were looking at before the recession hit.</p>
<p>Good luck.</p>
<p>silversaline said basically what I said in your other thread. But you should be aware that the economy/“recession” isn’t the cause of the pharmacy situation - it’s because of the increase in enrollment/schools, like you said - there are simply too many people graduating with PharmDs. </p>
<p>The recession has actually been over since June 2009 (<a href=“http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/20/the-recession-has-officially-ended/[/url]”>http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/20/the-recession-has-officially-ended/</a>).</p>
<p>Yeah, the increase in school is causing the surplus. This leads me to ask another question: will pharmacy schools eventually be a deciding factor in whether you get a job or not (i.e. someone who graduated from a better known school vs. someone who graduated from a newer school). And also, how is the engineering field looking right now? Demand? Surplus?</p>
<p>I don’t know about engineering, but I was talking to a pharmacy professor today (i’m a pharm major as well), and she said that there is still a shortage of pharmacists, and this will probably last until 2018 due to the baby boomers needing medication and whatnot. There has been less of a shortage due to an influx of new schools that have opened lately, but it still exists. It may require you to relocate to get these jobs though, it all depends on where you are.</p>