[kgba9231]

Americandream,

I appreciate you adding this article and my response is as follows:

Firstly, in the UK we have a nationalised health care system (as I mentioned already) so most of our healthcare needs are met for free (with a standard charge for rxs and no charge for consultations, lab tests, operations, etc.). However here in the US, we have to PAY for our healthcare (even if via subsidised employer covered insurance) out of the salaries we make.

Additionally, the average working person gets an annual total of 28 days of paid vaccation (it's 35-40 days depending on experience for some workers) in the UK. Here, we are lucky if we can get a week off let alone a month!

Thirdly, the stress levels associated with working here as a pharmacist (as previously mentioned in my prior msg) are not as high as in the UK. Mostly because of high levels of tech training and numeration, plus we are still limited to mostly hard copies of rxs.

These are just a few examples of the benefits that are not covered in the US and if you incorporate this into the US pharmacist salaries, then you will see that it becomes considerably less than the average 100K and equivalent to the 35-40K of a UK pharmacist's.

Hope this helps with your query. And, thank you all for your favourable and appreciative comments.

Shani

PS: the fourth and biggest reason is that in the US, the pharmacy opening hours are longer (no 24-hr pharmacies yet in the UK), so obviously you work longer hours and get paid higher wages. At least we don't have to spend most of our working schedules dealing with insurance companies out in the UK - which is the biggest drawback in the US pharmacy setting. Hence the lower stress levels and lower wages in the UK, but we are happier and healthier in some ways I guess.