The response to UnitedHealthcare CEO’s murder surely disproves the claim that Americans love the private health insurance system. It’s a political force waiting to be harnessed — but few in DC seem interested.
Agree, these are serious problems. I did consider going in to medicine, but realized that after taking on, like you say, a mortgage payment in student loan debt and spending years making little to no money in school, residencies, and internships, that the “doctors” salary was not that high after all. Rather you’ll spend your first several years playing catch up and paying off debt. Not to mention the hours…
The Biden SAVE plan actually made a massive change that makes it a lot more viable, especially if you do the PSLF program. It’s set up so that if you’re on an income-driven repayment plan, any interest not covered by your payment does not capitalize. So you might not make any progress on the principal of the loan while you’re in residency, but it won’t spiral out of control and the reduced payments count towards the 120 PSLF payments. I’m planning on doing a 3 year residency at minimum, maybe more, and probably a fellowship as well, so I’ll have 5 years of reduced payments, and then I’ll be working in non-profit community/county hospitals after that so I’ll be able to use PSLF. Running the numbers, I think the government will be eating about $275k-$300k of my loans.
Agree, these are serious problems. I did consider going in to medicine, but realized that after taking on, like you say, a mortgage payment in student loan debt and spending years making little to no money in school, residencies, and internships, that the “doctors” salary was not that high after all. Rather you’ll spend your first several years playing catch up and paying off debt. Not to mention the hours…
The Biden SAVE plan actually made a massive change that makes it a lot more viable, especially if you do the PSLF program. It’s set up so that if you’re on an income-driven repayment plan, any interest not covered by your payment does not capitalize. So you might not make any progress on the principal of the loan while you’re in residency, but it won’t spiral out of control and the reduced payments count towards the 120 PSLF payments. I’m planning on doing a 3 year residency at minimum, maybe more, and probably a fellowship as well, so I’ll have 5 years of reduced payments, and then I’ll be working in non-profit community/county hospitals after that so I’ll be able to use PSLF. Running the numbers, I think the government will be eating about $275k-$300k of my loans.