Happy Architecture Or Stressful Medicine?

Ok i'll get to the pooooint.

I've been having doubts with my careers and which one to choose. The first career i wanted to go into was Architecture. This was because it seemed like a fun job, and it was dead interesting to me.

Then i came across medicine. It was interesting because it was about the body and i had a natural interest in Immunology.

But from what i've heard Medicine is really STRESSFUL. The pay for medicine is fairly high however the salary for architecture is lower than i would have hoped for (apparently around £30 K). I would expect medicine to get in the way of my happiness because of all the tests, but architecture should be a happy career for me.

What do i choose between, happiness or money? I don't want to be earning around £30 K a year when i could be earning up to £100K being a Doc. But monesy DOES buy you happiness. Also i have to chose my A levels and quick, because im starting my AS subjects in September.

BTW I HATE Physics and Maths (but from what ive heard you don't need to take these for Architecture A level). Really Confused over how my career should go

I can see me as an architect designing stuff... i love architecture as it is a means of expressing ure artistic nature but hey...

so you want a continually low stress, low hours, low effort, low continuous validation/assessment job?

& earning £30k per year certainly isn't good enough?

hmm, good luck...

You should loose all these wooly notions about sitting at a drawing board designing beautiful buildings and get used to the idea of putting concept designs together in ridiculously short time frames that are heavily constrained by ludicrously tight budgets to be handed over to unhelpful contractors in design-build schemes and then project managing the entire scheme and explaining to your client why what you have designed/built is $1m over budget.:

For every one of those stressed, bawled at individuals, I can name you an architect who after 10 years is running their own practise, bringing in over £100K a year and working from an office next to home the hours he wants.

It all depends what type of architect you want to be and where you are working. For every one of those stressed, bawled at individuals, I can name you an architect who after 10 years is running their own practise, bringing in over £100K a year and working from an office next to home the hours he wants. It depends what risk / reward profile you're aiming for, how much natural ability you have and how good you are at organising your client base and spreading your reputation. For any profession (perhaps with the exception of medecine when your hours are dictated to you by your patients) you can be a blithering idiot, working 3 times as many hours as you need to just because you're unfocused and perhaps not in the right career. I wouldn't discourage anyone who deep down thinks their calling is in a certain field.

How much do you think Richard Rogers, Rem Koolhaas, Norman Foster, et al. bring in each year. I'm betting its a pretty large multiple of £30K - and I'm willing to take a bet that there is not a cosmetic surgeon or any other medical practioner in the world that can match their annual income. Yes they are the exception, top of their game, but someone's got to get there haven't they?

Plus if you want to make A LOT of money..... become a surgeon and go to america. Lots of plastic surgeons in america are multimillionaires so they can pick and choose when they work and who they work with.