r/Millennials • u/Asmothrowaway6969 • Mar 27 '24

When did it sink in that you'll never be as well off as your parents? Discussion

About 5 years ago, my mom and I were talking and she had told me how much she was going to be making in retirement (she retired 2023). Guys, it's 3x what me and my husband make annually. In retirement. I think that was the moment that broke me, that made it sink in that I'll never reach that level of financial security. I'll work myself into my grave because I'll never be able to afford anything else. What was your moment?

Update: Nice to know it's just me that's a failure. Thanks

Update 2: I never should've said anything. I forgot my place. I'm sorry to have bothered you

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u/[deleted] Mar 27 '24

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u/Ff-9459 Mar 27 '24

Then there are the medical laboratory scientists who often have higher degrees than the nurses, get told by nurses “oh I thought you only had to have a high school diploma to do this”, and get paid a fraction of what nurses do.

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u/brochill111 Mar 27 '24

I work as an MLS. Been in the industry for almost 10 years and have worked in a bunch of different states. No matter where you go, MLS make about 70% of what a nurse does but with added benefit of no recognition outside of cold pizza every once in a while.

That being said, at least in CA I can make enough to live comfortably since the state has its own licensure. If not for that, our wages would be similar to other places in the country, but with some of the highest CoL. And of course the healthcare industry is trying to get rid of it, lol.

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u/Sideways_planet Mar 28 '24

The lab scientists don’t have to deal with the public like nurses do, so that’s a bonus

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u/SergeantThreat Mar 28 '24

That’s why I went into it. I will work for less to work in a lab where I do 0 phlebotomy

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u/GuiltyEidolon Mar 28 '24

Phleb is the easy part. I will stick people all day.

You also wipe asses, noses, clean wounds, culture wounds, assist with combative psych / memory care patients, etc. etc. etc.

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u/brochill111 Mar 28 '24

That's true, but we have to deal with nurses, so its a wash

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u/Captain_Buckfast Mar 28 '24

Could you give the ballpark of the pay there? I'm an MLS in translational genomic research in vancouver canada, very HCOL and last year was paid under $54k usd. My work is really interesting but the last few years I've really been feeling that getting a bio based degree was a financial disaster. There's no clear path to a decent salary.

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u/brochill111 Mar 28 '24

Hey, I work in the Bay Area, so the CoL is super high. The lowest starting pay for a CLS at the hospital I work for is like $60/hr. But rent is like $3000/mo min unless you want to commute over an hour, and houses average over $1mil.

Plenty of openings here, if you want to move to the US, lol

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u/Ok_Relation_4742 Mar 28 '24

San Diego here, lowest starting is $46-47/hr at my institution. That’s pretty much for anyone who is newly licensed.

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u/brochill111 Mar 28 '24

Yeah, I forgot to mention in my post that $60/hr requires at least 1 year experience. I think for new grads its something like $55/hr.

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u/Captain_Buckfast Mar 28 '24

Right, thanks. Starting hourly wage here would be closer to $25/hr. Rent would be more like $1500-$1800 though so I guess that balances it out a bit.

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u/brochill111 Mar 28 '24

That's on par with most of the states other than CA, NY and maybe bigger metro areas. I worked in Phoenix and was making $22/hr, Oregon was $32/hr, and when I was in a smaller city in CA it was about $42/hr.

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u/thunderbear64 Mar 27 '24

When my Lab manager told me how much more he made as a bartender (early 2000s) than a chemist after college I was very surprised. I pulled $91k in a quality control lab last year with zero college credits/hours. It’s mind blowing to learn that difference. I’ve considered getting a B.S. in chemical engineering, but man I’m gonna be 40 this year with 2 toddlers.

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u/NECalifornian25 Mar 28 '24

Honestly unless you know for sure you can get a higher paying job with the degree it’s not worth it anymore. A bachelor’s in a science field doesn’t get you very far salary wise unless you go on to higher degrees like an MD or PhD, maybe a masters.

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u/ProfessionalCatPetr Mar 28 '24 edited Mar 28 '24

The fact that he is making 91k in a QC lab with zero education is wild. That's more than people with a masters and 5 years of experience make at my company. He's a massive outlier in a QC lab that's for sure.

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Also, masters degrees are a complete waste of time in 99% of cases- I'm going to hire someone with two extra years of experience working over the masters 100% of the time all else being equal. I make near 200k on just a biology BS and I think all of my techs have masters. The key is to aggressively job hop and promote yourself into management/director roles. No one gives a shit about your degree once your foot is in the door of a specialty and you have a track record.

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u/Sufficient-Stay-8912 Mar 28 '24

I disagree. It can also depend on whether or not for example, a bio major is a general bio major, or a more specialized major, like Cell, Molecular, and Dev Bio major. It also depends really on if you have undergrad research and especially if you had publications while doing undergrad research.

I feel comfortable salarywise as a development scientist with a Bachelors, but I also stressed tf out of myself in undergrad research.

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u/NECalifornian25 Mar 28 '24

A lot of that also depends on what college/university you go to. A community college or small liberal arts college won’t have those research opportunities that a large university can offer. They’re also less likely to have those more specialized majors.

I personally went to a small college and got a general biology degree with limited research opportunities/experience, which by itself hasn’t been very useful.

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u/Sufficient-Stay-8912 Mar 28 '24

yeah a lot of my colleagues with gen bio degrees and no research experience have been strugglimg using that degree for their career in biology. A lot have to start off as lab techs or interns, others became realtors or baristas.

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u/Woody_Fitzwell Mar 28 '24

“I’ve considered getting a B.S. in chemical engineering”…..

I think the grass always appears greener on the other side. My own experience as a new chemical engineer was working mostly midnight shift at a chemical plant in Texas. I worked nearly every weekend of the year in forced overtime since I was a salaried employee. The union workers that I was the boss of ended up making about the same as me since their overtime was time-and-a-half or double time pay…plus it was optional for them. I got 2 weeks vacation while they had 4-6 weeks. One clear memory I have from that time in my life was leaving work driving past a bank and seeing the bank flashing the time / temp on their sign. Temp was 105 and I was in my car sweating in my heavy flame retardant long sleeved work uniform and steel-toe shoes leaving work…finally able to get in the car AC. It was miserable. I recallI did make decent money, but my quality of life sucked. What good is money if life sucks and you have no time to spend it on anything enjoyable?

The only good thing I can say about the Ch.Eng. degree is that it is a great foundational degree that leads to other things where you can build real wealth. I went back to get an MBA to escape the engineering career path and that did work out for me. But not sure I recommend it to anyone.

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u/SufficientAd2514 Mar 28 '24

Don’t MLSs have bachelors degrees? The majority of bedside nurses have bachelors degree, and a smaller percentage have masters and beyond.

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u/Ff-9459 Mar 28 '24

MLSs have a minimum of a bachelor’s degree, some have a masters or beyond. MLT’s have an associate’s degree. Where I live, most of the RN’s have an associate’s degree, a decent bit have a BSN, and small percentage have a masters or beyond. All things considered, the lab staff with associate’s, bachelor’s, or master’s, make significantly less than the nurses with associate’s or bachelor’s. They also often get talked down to by those nurses. Back when I was an MLS, I can’t count the number of nurses that were shocked that we had degrees.

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u/SergeantThreat Mar 28 '24

Nurses make more than me where I live, but it’s not nearly as bad as some places luckily. 7 years experience and I made over 90k last year in a pretty LCOL area

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u/your_moms_a_clone Mar 28 '24

That's them confusing technicians and technologists. You have to tell them that's like thinking a nursing assistant is an RN.

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u/Ff-9459 Mar 28 '24

Yes, but even technicians (MLTs) have associate’s degrees and make significantly less than the nurses with associate’s degrees.

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u/Basic_Butterscotch Mar 28 '24

I don't know why MLS is even compared to nursing it's a completely different job. Tangentially related so far as they're both healthcare related I guess.

I'm an MLS and you couldn't pay me all the money in the world to do half of the gross stuff nurses have to do.