I would like to explore career options, and both graduate programs excel personal satisfaction of helping the community.
Which one interests you more? Have you shadowed doctors and lawyers? Assuming you are interested in public interest law can you afford law school given the low salaries of public interest lawyers?
@TomSrOfBoston I honestly like both. Every since a was in grade school I was fascinated with science. When I got to high school, history, govt., and politics got my attention as well. I have shadowed doctors, but not lawyers. I’m not sure if I can afford law school, but I do know I’ll need to take out loans. What’s the salary for public interest lawyers anyways?
The mercenary answer is that the ROI for med school is way better than the ROI for law school, especially if you are interested in public interest law. Law school will cost you at least $150,000 and as much as $250,000, and that will be primarily financed by loans. But public interest lawyers make an average salary of between $43,000 and $50,000 a year depending on what kind of public interest law they do - $43,000 for legal services attorneys up to $50,000 for public defenders and prosecutors. (Data is from the National Association for Law Placement.) The highest salaries would be in federal agencies, where you could make in the $70-100K range, but that would still make it difficult to pay off those law school loans.
The other thing to remember is that a lot of these public interest jobs are in expensive metropolitan areas - New York, DC, Boston, etc. - where your $40-70K salary will go even less far.
Some law schools have loan repayment programs for graduates who choose to go into public interest law. Check those out. There is also the federal Public Service Loan Forgiveness program - if you finance your degree entirely with federal loans, work in public service for at least 10 years, and pay on time every month for 10 years, then the balance of the loan will be forgiven. Combined with income-based repayment, it can potentially make it at least possible to attend law school with the goal of being a public interest lawyer. (Still a risky proposition, IMO, as it limits your career choices and saddles you with debt that can interfere with your ability to buy a house, get married, have children, invest money, etc.)
Physician salaries range widely, from just over $200,000 a year for primary care physicians (pediatricians, internists, family practitioners) to $375,000 or more for certain specialists (anesthesiologists, radiologists, dermatologists, orthopedists). Check out the Medscape Compensation Report 2016 for the full range. Thing is, though, the vast majority of doctors will make enough money to repay their med school loans and live a very comfortable lifestyle - especially once they are 10-15 years into their career and have repaid most of their debt.
There are lots of other caveats, though - many doctors report dissatisfaction with their work, with the amount of paperwork they have to do and the amount of time they can spend with their patients. In this era of managed care, many doctors don’t have the freedom of practice they used to have - small doctors’ practices are being bought up by hospitals and large HMOs, and doctors now often have bosses and managers who are dictating their scope of practice, fees and procedures. I think something like 50% of doctors would not choose to go to go medical school again, and/or would advise someone else not to go to medical school. There are a couple of Medscape reports that report on this information, too.
Have you explored any other career options besides medicine and law? There are many, many, many careers that lead to helping other people, including ones in areas you might not think of as traditionally public-serving.
@juillet Thank you for your long thoughtful response, I appreciate it! I have explored other careers besides medicine and law. I have done a job shadow for a pharmacist, but I didn’t really like the pharmacy practice. What matters is that law or medicine fascinated me the most, but it will be a rough route for either pathway.
IMO, job security is the biggest factor separating med school from law school or MBA. Lots of law graduates (unless you’re in top law schools or top rank in class) won’t have a job after graduation, MBAs are even worse. But they all incur huge amounts of student loans. However, no such worry for med school grads. Another job security issue is when you get older, you’ll become prime target for layoff in law or MBA (unless you made partner). Again no such worry for physicians, many of them can opt for working less hours (ie, part-time) or open their own practice while still maintain comfortable lifestyle. Try that in corporate/financial world…I guess one could go for contracting work.
Similar employment issue exists in pharmacy because there are too many pharmacy graduates than available spots. Med school spots are highly regulated. If you have the grades and determination, med school beats law and MBA hands-down in terms of ROI and finding employment upon graduation.
I see that you are currently a sophomore in college. Have you done any of the pre-med required courses like Chem and Bio? Med school is extremely GPA sensitive so your current GPA really matters.
@SuzyQ1 I guess I was interested in the sciences, but then there’s math. I will need to take some math courses in order to go on forward with the sciences, and my math skills aren’t that strong either.