Why are doctors so bad with money?

People who go into medicine and other healing professions are generally less interested in finances and building wealth than similarly ambitious and intelligent people in other fields. Their educational institutions promote a taboo against talking about money and provide no education in business, personal finance, or investing all while charging incredibly high amounts of tuition. This normalizes the experience of carrying large amounts of debt, which results in doctors starting out their financial lives not only a decade, but also hundreds of thousands of dollars behind their college roommates.

Doctors also tend to be trusting of other professionals, mistakenly assuming that all professions share the same code of ethics. The financial services industry takes advantage of this trust to charge high fees and sell doctors products they do not need. Due to their high income, doctors are deliberately targeted by financial advisors, insurance agents, mortgage lenders, realtors, and attorneys. Many doctors also assume that because they know a lot about medicine that they also know a lot about the financial world, which is unfortunately rarely true. Ignorance and overconfidence are a dangerous combination and even a high income cannot overcome them.

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