When we started medical school, we had no idea what we were doing with money. Financial education for medical students simply was not part of the curriculum.
We could tell you the steps of glycolysis. Ask us about student loan repayment strategies, what a Roth IRA was, or how to budget on a tight income, and you got a blank stare.
We were far from the only ones.
The Financial Education Gap Nobody Tells Medical Students About
Medical education is thorough. We learn how to diagnose rare diseases, interpret complex imaging, and make life-or-death decisions under pressure, and we spend years on material that would make most people’s heads spin.
Nobody teaches us how to manage money, though.
It isn’t covered in undergrad or in medical school, and it certainly isn’t covered before we start making financial decisions that will affect us for decades.
We started Clinic to Capital after realizing how unprepared we were for the financial side of a medical career. We’re learning about personal finance as we go, and we figured we’d share what we find, because if we’re confused about this stuff, you probably are too.
You might be dealing with six-figure student debt, trying to budget on a resident’s salary, or finally making attending money without knowing where to start. The underlying problem is the same: medical training doesn’t prepare us for the financial side of our careers.
Why This Matters
You might be thinking, “Yeah, but doctors make good money eventually, so does it really matter?”
Fair question. We thought the same.
The research says it does: financial literacy affects job satisfaction, productivity and burnout among physicians. When you’re stressed about money, everything else gets harder. Your focus and your mental health suffer, and the career you worked so hard for can start to feel like a trap.
Studies indicate that over 70% of medical trainees report their graduate education didn’t give them the tools needed for financial success. That is a large hole in our training.
The problem isn’t only American, either. Canadian medical residents averaged just 53% on a basic financial literacy quiz, and many said they simply don’t have time to learn about money around their schedules.
The Cost of Becoming a Doctor
Here is what we’re dealing with.
In the US, the average medical student graduating in 2024 with debt owed around $212,000. At private schools it’s higher, and some students leave with over $227,000 in loans.
Canadian students often face lower debt loads, but they still graduate with significant financial burdens. Wherever you train, the timeline is the same. You spend your twenties accumulating debt (or at least not earning), then enter residency making around $68,000 a year in the US, while friends from college have been building careers and savings for years.
That is why financial planning matters so much in medicine.
What Happens When Medical Students Miss Financial Education
Without financial education, medical students and residents make preventable mistakes that cost real money.
We might:
- Choose the wrong loan repayment plan and waste tens of thousands of dollars
- Fail to start investing early, missing out on years of compound growth
- Make poor spending decisions because we never learned to budget on a resident salary
- Get hit with unexpected tax bills because nobody explained physician taxes
- Fall into lifestyle creep when attending paychecks finally arrive
- Trust biased advice from “financial advisors” who are really just trying to sell us a course
Every one of these mistakes is avoidable, and every one costs money that could be going toward our future.
What gets us is that almost 90% of students said they wanted financial education to be included in medical school.
Most students know this knowledge matters. They just aren’t being taught it.
The gap continues after medical school, too. Research has shown that many residents and trainees still lack knowledge about loans, investing and retirement planning.
The Unique Financial Path of Medicine
Medicine’s finances differ from other careers in a few ways. Training is long, many of us carry substantial debt, and we start working later.
Most of our college friends graduated at 22 and started earning right away. They’ve had years to build emergency funds, max out retirement accounts and learn about money through trial and error.
Most medical professionals, meanwhile, are in their late twenties or early thirties before they see their first real paycheque. When it arrives, we’re supposed to know what to do with it: how much to save and spend, whether to pay off loans aggressively or invest, how to handle taxes, whether to buy a house.
It’s a lot, and the stakes are high because the numbers are much larger than most people our age deal with.
It Doesn’t Have to Be This Way
Financial literacy isn’t rocket science.
It’s easier than the complement cascade or reading an ECG. Budgeting, investing, understanding debt and planning ahead are fairly straightforward once someone explains them in plain language.
You don’t need an MBA or to become a finance expert. You need the fundamentals, and an idea of how they apply to your situation as a medical professional.
That’s why we started learning this stuff, and why we share what we learn here on Clinic to Capital.
We shouldn’t have to graduate with six figures of debt and no financial knowledge. Knowing how to manage our money lets us focus on what we went into medicine for, which is taking care of patients.
Where Medical Students Can Start With Financial Education
If you’re reading this and feeling overwhelmed, start small.
Pick one area. It might be understanding your student loans, learning the basics of investing, or working out a budget on your current income, for which the free Budget Planner from the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada is a good start.
Learn that one thing well, then move on to the next.
Read blogs like this one and listen to podcasts by physicians who’ve figured out the financial side. Talk to residents or attendings who manage their money well, ask questions, and make a few small mistakes along the way.
Start now rather than later.
Every year you wait is a year of compound interest working against you instead of for you, and every month is a chance to build better habits.
We can’t afford to ignore financial education until we’re attendings making real money.
It can make the difference between a career that sustains us financially and one that slowly drains us.
After the applications, the exams, the studying and the sacrifices it takes to become a doctor, we should know how to build a financial future as solid as our medical training.
So let’s figure this out together.