Professionals or "workers"

Nurses Union

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I am attending nursing school in Michigan, a very "union" state. I have recently moved here from Texas, a right to work state. There is a big political issue going on here about Right-to-work. And until people started posting on our student fb page, I don't think it dawned on me that nurses had a union. I have a lot to learn fast, I guess.

The biggest issue I have is that I don't really want to be a "worker" that needs protection by a union, but would rather be considered a "professional". Other than teachers, are there any other degreed professions that have a union? I may just be ignorant because of my life in Texas, but I haven't been able to find any or references. Most just have professional societies ... which we also have...but these are not unions. It almost seems demeaning that teachers and nurses, both primarily female professions, feel the need to be "protected" like lower skilled workers.

I have a degree in Bioengineering and never heard of a union for engineers. Lawyers and doctors don't have unions. I couldn't find one for respiratory therapists, physical therapists, or registered dieticians. I know in both my husband's line of work (teamster) and my father-in-laws work (electrician), you no longer could belong to the union when you moved to a professional role (management of any sort).

Isn't it kind of demeaning to our professional status to unionize?

(Please be kind, I am asking really asking to learn and not to challenge.)

Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.
I'm not talking about anything specific in THIS thread, but just read the numerous ADN vs. BSN debate threads.

*** I think I have read most of them and I have never read any anti higher education messages. If you have then lets see them.

You yourself have said that you won't allow your SICU to hire BSNs because they are not as good as ADNs.

*** Trying to figure out if you are deliberaly making up false things, have me confused with someone else or what. I am not and have never been in any position to "allow" or not allow any SICU to decide who they will hire. I have never made any such decision or claimed that I made such a decision. I cerainly do NOT think BSNs are not as good as ADNs I don't know where you get that. I suspect you are attempting to mislead people.

What is true is that one hospital where I work as an instructor in the Critical Care Nurse Residency program does no hire new grad BSNs into the SICU but that is related their track record of not completing the required contract.

Specializes in retired LTC.

One other issue re unionization of nurses in healthcare - union work strikes. Nurses will strike for the same reasons that other union do - wages, benefits, working conditions, etc. They are also passionate about patient care issues. However, there seems to be little public sympathy for striking nurses.

Some short time ago, a union facility near me went out on strike with nurses picketing outside. However, it was business as usual. Nobody seemed to stop at the gates.

I wonder how many of the posters here who are PRO-union would honor their union's picket line and stay out??? STRIKES are always a possibility with unions - whether you are supportive or not. Strikes are a leverage tool of unions and needs solidarity of its members.

What are our strike-able professional issues - safe patient care practices and decent compensation for our services provided. Even Florence N. was working for those issues way back when...

Unionization is only one tool in the quest for professionalism IMHO

*** I think I have read most of them and I have never read any anti higher education messages. If you have then lets see them.

Apparently any time that is spent in school not "learning the trade" is a waste according to most of the threads.

STRIKE. That gets management's attention. But then they bring in the scabs. It costs hospitals money to import scabs. It's the cost of doing business for them.

I'm not sure why a masters-prepared nurse would be working at the bedside (unless they couldn't find another job), but that's another issue. Show me a masters nursing program where your undergrad can be music, and you are done with the masters in 2 years. Please.

Vanderbilt has a direct-entry MSN for non-nurses that is two calendar years (you're in school both summers). I don't know offhand of any other two-year programs, but I would bet big money that they are out there.

I didn't realize unions were such a touchy subject. Why so much emotion?This would make an interesting topic of research-comparing nurses who work in union workplaces and nurses who work in right-to-work. I have only known right-to-work.
Ive recently realized myself that its a touchy subject. My father in law has a bumper sticker that reads union with a circle around it and a line across it (anti union) I dont get it. But Im completely ignorant on the subject
...Isn't it kind of demeaning to our professional status to unionize?

Definitely, but some within our profession want to be "taken care of". Considering that we are capable of saving or breaking a person's life and are expected to know and practice doing the right thing for the patients, this is rather puzzling, no?

Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.
Definitely, but some within our profession want to be "taken care of".

*** Not wanting to be abused is a far, far different thing than wanting to be taken care of.

*** Not wanting to be abused is a far, far different thing than wanting to be taken care of.

Apparently not all that far in some professions. If a person does not want to work where she feels (or is) abused, that person can and should leave. Expecting some union "leaders" to fix it for them is a very ineffective means of dealing with it.

Apparently not all that far in some professions. If a person does not want to work where she feels (or is) abused, that person can and should leave. Expecting some union "leaders" to fix it for them is a very ineffective means of dealing with it.

IMO, it's not a matter of "expecting some union 'leaders' to fix it," it's a matter of everyone working together to fix it. I was raised in the South, in a "right to work" state, in an anti-union family, but it's always seemed pretty simple to me -- management is certainly "organized" to protect its interests; it seems only fair that workers should also be organized to protect their interests. Just leveling the playing field a little ...

Specializes in Peds/outpatient FP,derm,allergy/private duty.
Ive recently realized myself that its a touchy subject. My father in law has a bumper sticker that reads union with a circle around it and a line across it (anti union) I dont get it. But Im completely ignorant on the subject

I think it's even more touchy with nurses because historically, nurses deal with martyr archetype. How dare the angel of mercy want more pay and benefits? She is on the picket line and leaving her patients inside the hospital to suffer! Old attitudes die hard. Unfortunately though, both sides use the plight of patients as a political pawn. It's not a black and white situation.

I remember when the union got enough petitions for a vote at the hospital I worked for in the mid-70s. It was all out WAR. Absolutely insane. The union lost then. Since then I've watched the union's opposite number in that battle and other companies I've worked for run rampant over worker's rights, completely destroying what the management at my old hospital did to make them more attractive than the union.

No union just means there is only one power broker in the game. Had that one power broker acted responsibly then, that hospital and many others would not be union hospitals today.

IMO, it's not a matter of "expecting some union 'leaders' to fix it," it's a matter of everyone working together to fix it.

Exactly. If something is wrong, it is up to those who have something to gain or lose (aka, "stakeholders") to fix it.

I was raised in the South, in a "right to work" state, in an anti-union family, but it's always seemed pretty simple to me -- management is certainly "organized" to protect its interests; it seems only fair that workers should also be organized to protect their interests. Just leveling the playing field a little ...

Management should be organized and effective in protecting the interests of the hospital and its patients; that includes being reasonable with staff, which in turn must be individually organized and reasonable toward management and each other. The idea that this has to be an "us vs. them" scenario will only create hardship in the larger scheme of things. Teachers are recently finding this out, and many other industries have already learned this; sadly, few of either group has learned from this.

I guess I am not as into "leveling the playing field" as much as I am into doing the right thing for the patient and doing the best I can do at the job. If I believe I am not being paid adequately for my work, I move on. When people realize this, then poor management will have no choice but to straighten out its act, or close down. I do not want some clown "representing" me and I certainly do not want my money being used for something I do not wish to fund nor support. I know what I want and I pursue that, plain and simple.

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