The healthcare profession is in crisis from the COVID-19 pandemic.
The headlines say it all:
“Doctors Are Calling It Quits Under Stress of the Pandemic”
“Nearly half of doctors are rethinking their careers, finds COVID-19 survey”
“Are More Women Physicians Leaving Medicine as Pandemic Surges?”
COVID-19 has ravaged America, with more than 9.7 million infected and 236,000 dead. Perhaps no profession has felt its devastating effects more than medical providers. According to one report, as many as one in 16 Americans (5.9%) infected with COVID-19 is a healthcare worker.
This physical, emotional, and financial stress has many physicians re-evaluating their careers going forward. For these physicians questioning their path going forward, there will be two choices:
- To double down.
- To change course.
For physicians choosing to stay the course, doubling down may mean staying the course in the face of increasing hazards, working longer hours – all for the same or less pay.
Some of these physicians may feel they have no choice. We physicians can be a stubborn bunch. We put in long hours in our undergrad studies to get good grades then more hours studying for the MCAT – all to get into a good medical school. Then we endured medical school, stressful residencies, fellowships, and board exams.
I get it. After spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on our education, countless hours studying and preparing to be physicians, it’s a very difficult decision to pivot from what we’ve worked so hard for. In the field of Behavioral Finance, there’s a concept in investing called the Endowment Effect.
The Endowment Effect is an investment bias where we place more value on something we own than something we don’t own. This bias means that we often hold on to investments long after they’ve become irrelevant to our goals and long after an alternative investment would better serve our long-term purposes and goals.
Is an Endowment Effect causing you as a physician to cling to the course you’re on right now rather than pivoting?
I’m not suggesting that any physician abandon their careers. On the contrary. I’m suggesting that you consider reassessing your financial course and consider pivoting.
I am very fortunate that I have not suffered the devastating effects of COVID – both emotionally and financially – like some of my colleagues. That’s because I’ve always had a fallback plan.
I never anticipated something like COVID-19 landing on our shores and shaking up our profession, but I always wanted to be prepared for a crisis – one that would prevent me from working or from maintaining my income level. I knew that I needed other sources and streams of income as a fallback.
Like many of you, I had to overcome my initial biases before pivoting. Like many of you, I was very proud of all the time and hard work I put into becoming a physician. It would have been very easy to cling to my degrees and my licenses and keep staying the course, but once I decided to pivot to seek other streams of income, I felt a tremendous load taken off my back.
What started out as a simple goal to supplement my income with passive streams of income as a fallback has now become my principal source of income. I work a few days a month in my medical practice because I want to, not because I have to.
What will the second half of your career look like?
Will you still be a physician because you want to and not because you have to? If you want to be in the position of being impervious to external stresses like COVID-19 or any other future crisis, you will have to stop working for your money.
UNLESS YOU MAKE YOUR MONEY WORK FOR YOU, YOU WILL ALWAYS BE WORKING FOR IT.
Passive investments in cash-flowing alternative assets that grow over time have long been the assets of choice for elite investors – the ultra-wealthy, family offices, and institutional investors like university endowments and private foundations.
Why the appeal of private passive income investments? Because these assets have the potential to deliver above-market, recession-proof returns with less volatility. Creating multiple streams of passive income from these types of assets has been the key to building and maintaining wealth for these elite investors.
Like many of you, when I first started out in my career, I wanted to reward myself and my family for all the years of hard work to get to that point. I sunk a lot of money into assets that only took more money out of my wallet – a big home, nice cars, vacations, and so on.
Once I realized that the only way to get out of the rat race was to acquire productive assets that put money into my pocket instead of destructive assets that drained money, I cut the cord to depending on my job for income.
Multiple streams of income from these productive assets have put me in a position to work because I want to and not because I have to.
For physicians facing a mid-career crisis, are you willing to pivot? What will the second half of your career look like? Do you want to keep staying the course or are you willing to pivot for more financial and personal freedom?
Don’t wait until it’s too late.