About 8 years ago, you could graduate from high school and enter pharmacist programs that lasted 5 years. Today the primary degree is a PharmD, which requires 3 years after ugrad. Good schools usually have multiple tracks . . . 1) retail, 2) research, and 3) clinical.
The retail pharmacists are your CVS and Walgreens crew. The jobs are quite monotonous but if you've got a people personality, don't mind standing, and willing to be a cog in the corporate machine you are pretty much guaranteed 70K+ (depending on location).
Research pharmacists typically have 1-3 years of post-PharmD training (fellowship) in some field of specialization (molecular pharmacology) and work in universities or for the evil empire (Pfizer). The pay will be dependent on skills and choice of employer.
Clinical pharmacists are found in hospitals/clinics. Most train in residency programs after their PharmD doing specialties like infectious disease, intensive care, cardiac care, etc. They provide a similar function to retail pharmacists but they typically interact with physicians instead of patients. They are integral parts of some clinical teams particularly in disciplines like infectious disease, cancer treatment (oncology chemotherapy), and pediatric medicine. They may Round on the wards with residents/attendings, staff inpatient/oupatient pharmacies in the hospital, or be wholed up in tiny rooms surrounded by textbooks awaiting a call from physicians who didn't learn much in Pharmacology.
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