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Well since you asked for a counseling psychologist, who would actually know what you need to do, let me chime in here. I'm on my internship now and will complete my phd (in four years thank God) next summer.
The others are right in that with JUST a MA degree you can work with anyone (same is true for phd work of course) if you use a general degree. A social work degree is NOT the same as a MA in counseling and while some agencies will hire you others will not because they want you to have specific training that is not typically a part of social work programs, ie learning how to use the diagnositic manual that most insurance companies expect diagnoses to come from so they can reimburse you--it may seem minor but we are about to have to train all the social workers on staff on an instrument that I've been using for six years now and they have essentially never utilized.
You can work with an LPC, or similar license, in most states but you also have to pay for weekly supervision (unless it's part of your compensation package and that usually lowers your salary) while you get your two thousand hours and I believe have be under someone else's direct supervision after that indefinitely--meaning it's doubtful you'd be able to do private practice work unless a licensed psychologist was willing to supervise you indefinitely. Once you get the phd you work for a year longer than you would for the LPC to meet your hours requirement but that officially ends you needing any type of supervision from that point on when you get licensed.
As far as specialization goes, just note that the more specialized the degree is the more restricted your career options become in some sense. I could have done a sports psych phd but it wouldn't have given me the more generalized training I would need to do what I want to do now and that is focus on more family concerns, emotional disorders and the like. By picking up cognates (doctoral majors essentially) I still got the specific information I needed without jeapordizing my training experience and future marketibility.
Depending on your area a two to four year (for those folks that are working full time and can't attend classes like other students) may be your best option. But if you were going to do that (and then tack on AT LEAST another 18 months to finish the 2000 hours typically) you might as well consider a MA/PhD program which is anywhere between 5 and 7 years usually and then there's no starting over in a new program with new issues if you decide the PhD was really what you wanted. And it's not just about the potential earning power either, I can do anything now from run a college counseling center to teach college to be a contract psychologist for the military if I wanted to. It would be difficult at best for me to do that with a MA or a MSW. And I understand everyone's concern that school is hard but if it was easy then you'd have a lot of less qualified people out there harming other folks who really need help.
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