This page presents an interactive visualization of cumulative career earnings across medical specialties, starting from the first year of residency and extending through attending practice. You can explore how differences in training length and compensation compound over time by adjusting the year range and selectively toggling specialties on or off. The goal is to make long-term tradeoffs between specialties more concrete and comparable at a glance. This tool is a work in progress.
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Retirement Savings by Medical Specialty
Building on the earnings trajectories above, this chart models how a fixed percentage of annual income might translate into long-term wealth when saved consistently and allowed to compound over time at a conservative assumed annual return of 10%. It incorporates the effects of training duration, income transitions from residency to attending practice, and optional medical school debt with interest and paydown dynamics. By adjusting the savings rate, year range, and specialty selection, you can explore how early-career constraints and later earnings interact to shape net retirement wealth. Like the earnings chart above, this is a simplified, illustrative model and remains a work in progress.
Assumptions:
- Salary data is from medscape (2025).
- Residency salary is $67613.
- Fellowships: For some specialties (e.g. radiology / pathology) where almost everyone does a fellowship, I assumed a fellowship year and calculated that as an extra year of residency.
- Annual return on investment is 10%.
- Medical school loans: Default value is $250,000 at graduation. Interest rate is 8%. 15% of yearly income is used to pay down loans / applied to savings as a default.