Career Change to Pharmacy?

[ERD50]

Pharmacists fresh out of pharmacy school in WI are starting at $90,000 plus a guaranteed bonus when you hit one year, usually around $10,000-$15,000.

I don't know any pharmacists with 3 or more years of experience making LESS than $125,000 a year.

Also, they frequently get "signing bonuses" of up to $20,000 to move from one big chain to another...........

Hmmmm, my kid is a bio-chem major. He has talked about pharmacy school. Maybe I should listen more closely?

His GFs dad is pharmacist. He is now doing some kind of work with their computer systems - not sure if it the support stuff for pharmacists, or some other aspect of the pharmacy business, but he is on a more regular schedule now. And also near 'normal' retirement age. But I guess he did his time with all the wacko retail hours.

-ERD50

 

[FinanceDude]

Is this in exchange for a normal 40-hour work week?

Depends on who you work for. At Walgreens, they work more like 50-55, but the pharmacist get 1/4 a day of extra vacation for every week they work over 50 hours a week, and from what I heard they are going to discontinue that very soon.......

So, if you want 40 hours a week, take a 35% pay cut and work at the VA..........

 

[Sam]

Depends on who you work for. At Walgreens, they work more like 50-55, ...

So let's assume 52.5 hours a week. Or 12.5 hours overtime per week. Overtime pay is 1.5x regular pay.

40x + (12.5 * 1.5x) = 90000/52
3055x = 90000
x = $29.46/hour for a pharmacist

For a Chemical Engineer
x = 56000/2080
x = $26.92/hour

How many years of college are required to become a pharmacist?

 

[Sam]

I am a ChE (somebody calls us 'CNs')

Isn't CN the abbreviation used for Chemical Engineering? CE is for Civil Engineering.

CN was used at the university I went to, and is still used today as far as I know. I have seen ChE used too, but not quite as often.

 

[Ed_The_Gypsy]

Sam,

My professional association is the "AIChE"--the American Institute of Chemical Engineers. There may be other abbreviations outside of the US; I don't know.

Ed

 

[NinjaPigeon]

So let's assume 52.5 hours a week. Or 12.5 hours overtime per week. Overtime pay is 1.5x regular pay.

40x + (12.5 * 1.5x) = 90000/52
3055x = 90000
x = $29.46/hour for a pharmacist

For a Chemical Engineer
x = 56000/2080
x = $26.92/hour

How many years of college are required to become a pharmacist?

If I'm understanding you right, you were pointing out that pharmacists don't "really" make that much more money since they are working harder. However, I'd much rather work harder the first 10 years of my life than have to work an additional 10 years

 

[FinanceDude]

So let's assume 52.5 hours a week. Or 12.5 hours overtime per week. Overtime pay is 1.5x regular pay.

40x + (12.5 * 1.5x) = 90000/52
3055x = 90000
x = $29.46/hour for a pharmacist

For a Chemical Engineer
x = 56000/2080
x = $26.92/hour

How many years of college are required to become a pharmacist?

4 years undergrad, and 3 years of pharmacy school, plus you need to pass a state board exam.

The smart ones become Head Pharmacists, which run a region and make big bucks...........

When my dad graduated pharmacy school in 1955, he made about $4000 a year............

 

[Sam]

If I'm understanding you right, you were pointing out that pharmacists don't "really" make that much more money since they are working harder. However, I'd much rather work harder the first 10 years of my life than have to work an additional 10 years

It was just a practical financial analysis. By the time the individual has completed the degree in pharmacy, the chemical engineer already has 3 years of working experience. The ChemEng would be making more money (per hour) than the newly minted pharmacist. The ChemEng has been making money in the past 3 years while the pharmacy student was spending.

 

[FancyBear]

It was just a practical financial analysis. By the time the individual has completed the degree in pharmacy, the chemical engineer already has 3 years of working experience. The ChemEng would be making more money (per hour) than the newly minted pharmacist. The ChemEng has been making money in the past 3 years while the pharmacy student was spending.

That is the point of the weekend program. I will still be working as a ChE /CN /whatever with the exception of the last year. So I'm really not losing income, just time. However, I am recently divorced with no real social life so I have time. I also have all the prerequisites and took the PCAT already (very easy) so it's just 2 years of classes, one year of clinicals.

My main goal was not the money (though it is a part of it) but the flexibility (i.e. part time work, easier relocation, not being an engineer, etc.). Yes, I will have to pay for school but I also think I will have less of a chance of being laid off as a pharmacist (happened once already) and I stand to lose more income that way than with the loans.

Jobs in my field are not abundant where I live and I don't really want to relocate. But I do like all of the comments. You all bring up some very interesting points.

 

[mjarzoms]

Well you can always move to Houston TX. Clueless newbie engineers fresh out of school are making 65k+.

I would look on monster.com, rigzone.com, etc. Maybe post your resume and see what happens, you will probably be swamped with opportunities and take down your resume due to the flood of responses from headhunters.

Finding something stable and long term would be the rub when chasing money like this.

 

[Lagrange Multiplier]

Another Take on the Profession

People are generally very nice to you. Is it easy to find a part-time job.

My older sister works in retail pharmacy as well and doesn't enjoy the people aspects of it. First, she reports that there are a lot of elderly customers with no post-secondary education to speak of that are more than happy to tell her how to fill their prescriptions. Then there are the ever-present closeted addicts with forged prescriptions. Finally, there are the pharmacy techs, who never made it past high school, but whose egos inflate enormously when they happen into a technical profession. As a pharmacist, she is also a de facto supervisor and has to deal with their interpersonal conflicts, alliances, and rivalries.

The average salary is $120,000/year in Southern CA not including bonuses or overtime.

I believe my sister does all right, but I don't think she's on that kind of gravy train. But then again, she joined the profession before the current boom and I understand that there is salary inversion, where kids straight out of school can earn as much or more as longtimers, especially in "hot" areas of the country. Regulation and the high barrier to entry is what keeps salaries relatively high. Plus you're relatively safe from offshoring.

What sucks about being a pharmacist is the schedule. It's all over the place. Weekends, evenings, holidays - no 9-5 unless you're really lucky.

My sister's experience is that retail (drug stores, grocery store pharmacy, discount retailer pharmacy) wants you to work 10-12 hour shifts as well. So you might only work three or four days a week, but each of those days is completely filled with work (and collapsing afterward).

I should also mention that my sister acquired carpal tunnel syndrome from using the pharmacy computers (she's petite and the pharmacy really is designed for people taller than she is).

 

[Martha]

Welcome to the board LeGrange. So you a math man? If you can have LeGrange Multiplier as your screen name, I should change mine to Rule against Perpetuities.

 

[Lagrange Multiplier]

Welcome to the board LeGrange. So you a math man? If you can have LeGrange Multiplier as your screen name, I should change mine to Rule against Perpetuities.

I studied some math in college, but the real reason for the moniker is that my usual monikers (hottie13, thuglife4eva, etc.) were taken. O0

 

[roadkill]

4 years undergrad, and 3 years of pharmacy school, plus you need to pass a state board exam.

The smart ones become Head Pharmacists, which run a region and make big bucks...........

When my dad graduated pharmacy school in 1955, he made about $4000 a year............

My niece graduated a pharmacy program last year and accepted a position with the VA @ $85K to start, plus all the Federal level benefits.....25 years old. She told me that several of her classmates were offered positions with large national chains @ $100K to start.

 

[Brat]

Lagrange, your sister needs to insist that her workplace meet her needs. There is no excuse for inflexible workstations in this era. She is in a high demand occupation. They will go a long way to keep her from walking.

Yes, the elderly and uneducated can be needy. But middle age PhDs can be PITAs too. It's just that the elderly and uneducated are more often sick, they are her customers. If they are truly a challenge for her she should talk to a psychologist and develop a couple scripts of the other kind to help her deal with their behaviors.

Managing people isn't easy.

FancyBear, life is short. Coulda, woulda, shoulda when you are over 50 is a downer. I say go for it recognizing that there is no heaven on earth.

 

[rw86347]

My dad is a pharmacist. I think of it as a $115K/yr McDonalds job. Good pay, borring 9-5. But if you could do it part-time it would be great!

 

[patnmary]

Great Deal!

I'm a retail pharmacist at Target 56 bucks an hour, 5 minute drive, lunch break, 50 scripts a day, it's all gravy!

 

[FinanceDude]

I'm a retail pharmacist at Target 56 bucks an hour, 5 minute drive, lunch break, 50 scripts a day, it's all gravy!

I think Target would be a LOT less stress than Walgreens or CVS..........

 

[FinanceDude]

I'm a retail pharmacist at Target 56 bucks an hour, 5 minute drive, lunch break, 50 scripts a day, it's all gravy!

50 scripts a day? That's it? Man, my dad would have LOVED to work there back "in the day".

He did 150-200 scripts a DAY for 15 years, then switched to teaching phanrmacy techs........

 

[FinanceGeek]

You need to be prepared that as a pharmacist you'll regularly be asked some very non-trivial questions about managing health conditions, drug interactions, side effects, etc. This carries with it substantial ethical and legal liability...its much more than just counting pills, which by the way is all done by machine for the most part. And I suspect you'll come across a wide variety of junkies and other folks addicted to / abusing various substances. Not very pretty situation. Working in a hospital pharmacy would avoid much of this.

Personally if I were interested in pharmacy I'd investigate being a compounding pharmacist, not a commodity drug dispensing agent. The compounding side of that business always struck me as far more interesting, esp I would think for someone with a chemistry background.