[donutte]

At least in the US...

A psychiatrist is a physician. They go to the same schools as future radiologists, surgeons, and general practitioners. They learn gross anatomy by dissecting cadavers. They work 80 hour weeks learning to perform medical procedures on actual patients. After that, as doctors, they receive specialized clinical training in years-long residency programs. They are licensed by state medical boards in addition to their own professional orgs.

A psychiatrist is authorized to hand you a prescription for antibiotics, for amphetamines, for opioids. Christ, a psychiatrist is authorized to detain you on their credibility alone for upwards of 48 hours, arguably exceeding the legal detention power of the police.

Psychologists are certainly competent, well-educated experts in their discipline, but they don’t and can’t do all that. Of course the two deal with loosely related subjects, but there is very little comparison between them in any practical sense.