Why do psychologists earn so poorly?

Hello friends!

It is very interesting how in a given period, the same question and the same question can appear and reappear so often. On social networks and via email, I have seen this question regarding basic salaries in psychology, as well as criticisms by psychologists of the Federal Council of Psychology, due to the fact that (so far) it has not been able to pass any Law that sets a minimum value for psychologists to work.

In this text, I will comment with you about this relationship between graduating in psychology and earning money. The title expresses a feeling of many professionals about what they consider low wages, after having studied for 5 years or more. It also seeks to provide an answer for those who are thinking of studying psychology and hear from relatives or friends that psychology is not profitable, and that it is better to do something else.

See also – Job market – Psychology

Psychology Average Salary

Before we talk about Laws and Regulations regarding work and salary, it is useful to visualize what the salary range for psychologists is like today. For didactic purposes and to make it clearer, we can divide the salary into 3 tiers:

Starting salary – R$ 1.2 thousand to R$ 1.7 thousand.

Intermediate salary – R$ 2,000 to R$ 5,000.

Senior salary – R$5,000 to R$20,000.

I know several psychology professionals who are in the upper range (from 5 to 20 thousand). But, from my experience, I would say that the vast majority are situated in the intermediate salary, around 2,000 reais. For a small town, a salary of 2 to 3 thousand reais per month, let’s say, is a reasonable salary. Thinking about big cities, such as metropolises, many times it becomes insufficient to live with quality.

Need for a base salary

There is a Bill (since 2009) that wants to set a salary floor for professionals trained in psychology, PL 5440/2009, authored by Mauro Nazif. The deputy’s argument is that low salaries in the health area are a serious problem and that should be solved with a law that provides for the minimum wage. To date there has been no conclusion on the approval of this law. Detail, the fixed salary, already in 2009 as base salary or minimum salary for psychologists would be R$ 4,650.

See the petition on Avaaz for the approval of PL5440/2009. If you can vote you will also be contributing! (It costs nothing and takes less than 10 seconds).

Another related law is that which limits the number of hours worked per week to a maximum of 30 hours, PL 3338/2008, which is more advanced and practically certain to be approved. According to the latest news (07/15/2014), the law has already been approved by the Finance and Taxation Commission (CFT) of the Chamber of Deputies, and the Constitution, Citizenship and Justice Commission (CCJ) of the House. Now, it will go to the sanction of President Dilma Rousseff.

What we can conclude from these two laws is that psychologists’ salaries are less than 4,650 reais per month and that psychologists work more than 30 hours a week. Obvious conclusions, of course, but attest that the working hours are high, with wages that are, on average, less than 6 minimum wages.

Both laws, in my opinion, are necessary. The first is about the base salary, as it is very common to see situations in which the public authorities, whether municipal or state, open public notices for tenders with ridiculous salaries, such as 1 minimum wage for working 40 hours.

If there were a base salary, however, would all problems be solved?

Criticism of the idea of ​​resolving everything by Law and Regulations

In my opinion, there is a certain naivety that it is possible to solve everything through Laws and Regulations. I don’t know if this wage floor law will ever pass (the 30-hour law seems to be more acceptable). Anyway, we have to be critical of the idea that it is possible to end the problems of remuneration with a simple stroke of the pen.

Psychology, in its most varied areas of activity, is always a service. As a service is a priced commodity in our capitalist system. This price fluctuates according to the laws of the market, such as supply and demand, competition, etc.

To cite just three examples:

A newly graduated psychologist has, in addition to competition from more than 200,000 psychologists who have already graduated, competition from other professionals in related areas:

Clinical psychology: competition from psychotherapists of all kinds (such as Bach Flower Remedies, Holistic, Transpersonal, Body) and mainly from psychiatry. It may seem strange to put it this way, but a patient who has a certain psychological symptom will look for a solution to his problem. Instead of looking for a trained psychologist, you can look for a therapist or a psychiatrist, who sells the idea of ​​a miraculous cure for everything with magic pills, also endorsed by pharmaceutical industry advertisements. These remedies are not always effective and often cause more problems than solve the suffering that is, above all, psychological.

Organizational psychology: in this area, psychology within companies and industries, the professional can make use of a prerogative that is a niche market, the application of psychological tests. Of course, tests are also used in the clinic (and in other situations), but it is within the organizational environment that the professional can say what others cannot. Only the psychologist can apply a psychological test. However, for all other functions, such as personnel selection, recruitment, training, other professionals can be competitors: administrators, human resources technologists, economists, interns of all kinds. And it is important to be aware that an administrator can have a much more general and profound view of what an organization is than a psychologist. Good psychologists, successful in the organizational area, usually do an MBA, a master’s in administration, precisely for this reason.

Educational Psychology: in schools and educational institutions, psychology professionals may face competition from pedagogues. An area that is between the educational and the clinical, which is psychopedagogy, is filled by both psychologists and pedagogues. The possibility of applying the tests, being a prerogative, can also be a differential here.

Conclusion

After all that has been said, we can easily answer the question – “Why do psychologists earn so poorly?”

Well, first, we can say that psychologists are not always poorly paid. If we think that the average consultation is around 120 reais, we can see that, in a scenario of a full office, with 8 patients per day (8 hours of work), 5 days a week, we have a total of 19,200 reais per month. I bet that many psychologists will soon think that in reality this is not so. The truth is that this situation is more indicative of the senior salary, of a well-known and trained professional with a lot of experience.

In addition, not only can the price of the session vary from patient to patient, but the number of patients may not be as high or fluctuate throughout the year.

However, what I mean is that there are possibilities for high remuneration within psychology. In the area of ​​Human Resources, especially, there are many, many possibilities, as companies are constantly hiring talents to contribute to people management. An HR manager, trained in psychology, can earn (after a few years of practice) between 10 to 15 thousand reais. But, again, this is not common.

So we have to imagine the salary of psychologists as a pyramid similar to those pyramids made by nutritionists, which start at the bottom with fruits and vegetables (a lot of quantity) going to the top with chocolates and the like (a little quantity).

The vast majority of psychologists earn a monthly salary of around 2,000 reais per month. To say that this is a terrible salary is a subjective opinion. 3 monthly salaries is not enough? Many will say yes. Those who earn minimum wage can understand that it is a good salary.

Evidently, if the minimum salary law passes (which I think is complicated and unlikely – I hope I’m wrong), we would have a base salary of 4,650 reais. This salary, I believe, would be considered an excellent salary by most professionals, after all 6 salaries is not bad at all.

It turns out that we are in a capitalist environment. A company hires a psychologist and pays him 15,000 reais because the profits generated by his work will certainly exceed this amount. According to the calculations of a good friend of mine (who was a director of multinationals), the profit – to be worth the salary – would have to be 3 times the monthly amount, that is, 45,000 reais. To generate this value for the company, the professional has to be exceptional, with extensive training not only in psychology, as mentioned above, but also in administration and economics.

Anyway, as we are in this context, we have to see that even if a floor law is passed, there will be several situations in which the floor will not be complied with. Also due to the fact that the professional’s services may be without an employment relationship.

The idea of ​​competition, the law of supply and demand, explains the reason for wages. Whether they are high or low is a matter of individual value judgment. For those who are thinking of doing psychology, this text may give an idea of ​​the current situation in our field. Comparison with other professions such as law, medicine, engineering is also very common. But if we listen to professionals in these areas, we will also hear stories of who earns little, who earns more or less and who earns a lot.

Finally, I would like to indicate another text of mine, about the dilemma – Make money or do what you like?

Comments, criticisms and suggestions are most welcome!

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