pharmacist or engineer?

Question

which would you choose and why? pros/cons of each?

Answer 1

Well, I obviously would choose engineering since I'm already taking it. If you want to be in the medical field, you have a choice of becoming a biomedical engineer. And oftentimes, a degreen in biomed engineering can lead you to a medical degree.

For me, the most important thing is to keep my options open. I know I want to become some kind of doctor, become an engineer and teach. With what I'm doing right now, I have a lot of options in the future, if I don't slack off.

Engineering pros:
-challenge yourself all the time, applying the concepts you know to create something useful and efficient
-make good money
-in demand

Pharmacist pros:
-applying your knowledge of matching symptoms to appropriate medicine -- which is done by doctors most of the time for them, so all they do is give the prescription


My brain's tired right now, but I know that the pros that I said can be cons depending on how you look at it.


So still, my suggestion is to go for something that will keep your options open, and you know you'll love. You don't want to get stuck doing something in the future that you hate doing. Do your research and decide what you really want to do. I did mine for months and months, changed my goals, and my life goal remains the same -- to get a career wherein I can help people and challenge myself doing it -- and so I chose engineering, and I decided this year that I'm going to medical school after I get my degree. So it's working out for me.

Good luck!

Answer 2

I'd choose to be an engineer, because they make more money, and the work is bound to be more challenging. Being a pharmacist you see the same people every day and do the same work every day. No challenges. Engineer works for builders, computers, semiconductors, the choices are endless. They get a different project every few months, and they have to figure things out and learn about the project.

Answer 3

My brother, and two cousins are engineers. My brother is into hydrology, and my one cousin is into Nuclear energy and worked at three mile island, and my other cousin works at building bridges and structures for both the military and the public. My other cousin is a pharmacist. What I see in their lives is a big difference in where they do most of their work. Tanner, the bridge and structure builder spends about 65% of his time in an office, and works with a few colleges at a time on one project. This means a higher ability to expose one to personality clashes. Nathan works in an office almost completely, behind a panel of buttons and things that monitor the cooling tanks. Russell, my brother, works pretty much 50-50 as far as indoor out door. He enjoys getting dirty, and also having the chance to be clean. All three do extensive computer work. They use their minds to solve new problems every day. Tiffany, my pharmacist likes her job, and has very little chance of personality conflicts because most of her job is filling scripts, filing, ordering, double checking side effects with the persons drugs and always has to deal with the "public". There is not much said between her and her co-workers.

It is in my opinion, a question of how much you want to be paid, and just how much of peoples lives do you want to be responsible for. As an engineer, you may be tackling a project that if fails will kill hundreds of people. As a pharmacist, you are not solely the one responsible for medications. It is up to the individual to take the medicine as directed. I think too, that Pharmacists will have to deal with death more often. You get used to a customer coming in for meds and you find out all of a sudden that the med he is now coming in for is an anti cancer drug. You don't know if they are terminal or what, and pharmacists in small towns can get really connected with their communities.

My second thought too, is what is your return of disability. I know that CNA's are not considered "professional". Often times due to overtime CNA's will make more than those whom are higher qualified, but their rate of return after injury is the same as if they worked for McDonalds. Whether at a rest home or at Mc Donalds, if you fall, the pay back for the injury is the same. Yet, a nurse will get paid more and work fewer hours.

Pharmacist programs used to be two year programs, now they are four years. Did this change in education carry them from semi professional to professional?

As a person whom used to be in the work force, intelligent and educated, I went from a twenty dollar an hour job to disability in the blink of an eye. When you do get secured in your employment take out disability insurance, I wish I did.

Back to your engineer/pharmacist question, you may also want to check into how much life insurance policies are. Pharmacists may not have any, and engineers do. What is the reason for the insurance, and also, check to see what the work life span is of each field. I wanted to go into graphic art, but once I heard that you got hired by a company, you retired at forty five to fifty, however, you had a high risk for heart attack by the age of thirty two--not a good trade off. And only two percent of graphic artists actually make it in that field, so you have to be exceptional.

If I were you, and wanted to do engineering, I think engineering and designing cruise ships would be very challenging and you would live to be a ripe old age. I'd love to do that. I knew a man who went through the military for his G.I. bill and went into just this. Once he finished a project, he got called out to a ship that was for the military, and they asked him how the portion of his "part" worked so they could go in and repair it. Not that it was defective by design, but maybe by a faulty bolt. Engineering has so many ways in which you can and could work. Most have excellent insurance benifits and I know that disability paid by the job is exceptional. I hope this helps, and take care.

Answer 4

I would do engineering, because I like building things and working with my hands. It really depends on if you want to do a dirty job like some engineers have or a really clean job in pharmacy.

Answer 5

pharamcist:
pros- not too much competition in getting a job, decent pay, and easy to get job in what you wanna do, access to drugs
cons- you work at a CVS or Walgreens, not cool

engineer:
pros- interesting job, really cool possiblites for work, ability to travel
cons- too much school and too much math

Answer 6

engineer more money...

lots more money..

easier job...

dont be in service industry work for yourself and you could control your working life

Answer 7

i would pick engineer because you get more money and get to travel too.