Would you rather do something you want to do first most in life and get paid 50k, or do what you want to do second most in life and get paid 100k?
I plan to go to graduate school soon. I am having trouble deciding between a mental health counselor (50k in my state) and being a neuropsychologist (100k in my state). As a psychology major, I have always liked the idea of counseling in some sort of way. In my junior and senior years of college, I took a lot of neuroscience classes and found it extremely fascinating. It pays a whole 50k more too, and I do like the idea of a big paycheck, however it’s my second choice career which makes my decision hard.
i would become a neuropsychologist. You’re getting paid 2x more and its still you’re top choice career. If after a few years you don’t like it as much as you thought you would, at least you would have the money and leeway to go back to school / try a career as a mental health counselor
How much of a preference do you have for your first versus second choice?
Also, how much $50,000 versus $100,000 matters depends on how you live. I.e. it can matter based on whether you can live comfortably on $20,000, or if a comfortable living for you takes $70,000, based on your own spending habits and the general cost of living (especially housing) in the area.
If it were me, I would rather do what I want to do second-most, because I am petty and materialistic.
But this is a very individual question. For some people, there is such a large gap between their first choice career and anything else that they would rather live in poverty doing what they love than get rich doing something else. I know many of these kinds of people (academia tends to be fairly full of them). For some people, their first and second choices are pretty close together - or they may have no clear first choice, and they just like a lot - so they gravitate towards whatever was easiest/pays the bills/allows them to live the lifestyle they want. And for still others, money and the lifestyle they can live is the most important thing, and they would rather be slightly miserable at work so they can afford to do the things they want.
Also, these are not your only choices! A mental health counselor is someone who has a master’s in mental health counseling and usually practices as a licensed practical counselor (LPC) or the equivalent. But if you want to provide direct mental health therapy, you could become a clinical or counseling psychologist - a person who has a PhD from an APA-accredited program and provides mental health services, typically through talk therapy. These psychologists make a median salary of around $75,000 a year - and the amount will vary a lot depending on where you live and what you do (for example, psychologists in hospitals average $81K a year).
Actually, a neuropsychologist is really a type of clinical psychologist who has special expertise in neuropsychology, but you’d get your PhD from the same general type of program you would get a regular clinical psych PhD from. You would just have to choose a specific clinical psych program that has a neuropsychology specialization.
(Also, do keep in mind that in order to get a PhD in clinical psych or counseling psych, you generally need some research experience - about 2 years is pretty standard. This is true even if you mainly want to practice.)