2015 allnurses Salary Survey Results

allnurses.com conducted its first annual Salary Survey in January 2015 to find how various variables such as education level, licensure, experience, geographic location, and even gender affect nursing salary. More than 18,800 respondents provided some very interesting and credible data. Nurses General Nursing Salary Survey

2015 allnurses Salary Survey Results

The Survey

In January 2015, allnurses.com invited members and readers holding an active nursing license via the allnurses site as well as newsletters, emails and facebook to participate in a 10-minute online survey about nursing salaries. Respondents were asked 20 questions to characterize their educational background (degree, license), main roles as nurses, employer type, experience level, geographic location, etc....... After just 2 weeks from January 22 through February 3, more than 18,800 responses were received.

After reviewing the results, feel free to post your questions and comments. We can all learn from each other's input.

Respondent Profile

As shown in Figure 1, the majority of the respondents have a Bachelor's or Associate's Degree in Nursing(39.23% and 38.89% respectively), followed by Diploma (14.81%), Master's Degree in Nursing (6.38%), PhD (0.29%), Doctor of Nursing Practice(0.29%), and Doctor of Nursing Science(0.10%). With the difference in the number of BSN (6,891) and Associate (6,831) respondents so slim, it will be interesting to see what effect the mandates of some health systems requiring BSN or higher will have on these numbers in future surveys. To see what allnurses readers are already saying about this, go to BSN and Associate Nurses are Neck and Neck. Will this change?

FIGURE 1

39percent-nurses-have-bsn-degree.jpg

Figure 2 shows that the majority of respondents were overwhelmingly RNs (82.39%). A couple of questions this brings to mind: are fewer nurses beginning their career as LPNs/LVNs (14.84%), and will the number of APRNs (2.09%) increase fast enough to help meet the needs of a rapidly growing population in need of more autonomous healthcare providers.

FIGURE 2

82percet-registered-nurses.jpg

When asked, "Are you a manager or supervisor?" 17.58% (3,316) responded YES, while 82.42% (15,542) answered NO.

In response to the question, "What percentage of time is spent in direct patient care?", half of the respondents(51.85%) spend 75-100% of their time in direct patient care while 8.79% spend less than 5% in direct patient care. (Figure 3)

FIGURE 3

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It's not any surprise that the survey revealed that 92.26% of respondents are female and 7.74% are male.

FIGURE 4

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FIGURE 5

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Experience: Figure 6 show that 62% of the respondents have 10 years or less experience.

FIGURE 6

nurses-have-less-than-10-years-experience.jpg

Additional demographic of our respondents:

  • 82% work full-time; 11% part time; 7% other
  • 55% work at a Not-for-Profit facility
  • Facility Size: 25.47% less than 100; 21.45% = 100-300; 15.93% = 300-800; 11.94% = 800 - 1500; 11.54% = 1500 - 3000; 13.67% = more than 3000
  • Population Setting: 45.38% Urban; 32.15% Suburban; 22.47% Rural
  • 56% of nurses work in a hospital. To see the other places that top the list, read Where Do Most Nurses Work?

FIGURE 7

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FIGURE 8

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FIGURE 9 - Total Number of Respondents by Primary Specialty

Compensation

The interactive charts below will allow you to customize your view to include various filters that will affect the range of figures shown. You can do this by selecting items in the drop down menus at the top of the charts. Be sure to hover your cursor over the chart for more details.

These salary figures do account for cost of living indexes, which can greatly affect the value of salaries. Generally, the cost of living is highest on the West Coast and in the Northeast. The states in the South, Midwest, and sections of the Mountain West have the lowest cost of living. For more discussion about this, please read What States Pay the Highest and Lowest Nursing Salaries?

Although women dominate the nursing profession, do men make more money? - Read what our readers have said. Look at interactive graphs below and see what you think.

FIGURE 10 - Annual Salary Base Pay by Gender

FIGURE 11 - HourlyBase Pay by Gender

FIGURE 12

FIGURE 13

FIGURE 14

FIGURE 15 - Avg Salary by Degree/State

FIGURE 16 - Annual Salary by Degree/State

FIGURE 17 - Avg Annual Salary + Hourly Pay by Degree/State

FIGURE 18 - Annual Salary + Hourly Pay by Degree/State

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I liked it better when it was a thread and you could see more specific information together. Knowing someone's degree and state isn't that helpful. I liked it better when you could see the city people were from, their speciality, their degree and their pay and differentials. I felt like that information was more useful and relevant.

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Specializes in Peds, Med-Surg, Disaster Nsg, Parish Nsg.
kelseykelsey4 said:
I liked it better when it was a thread and you could see more specific information together. Knowing someone's degree and state isn't that helpful. I liked it better when you could see the city people were from, their speciality, their degree and their pay and differentials. I felt like that information was more useful and relevant.

You or anyone is welcome to add discussion here asking about those additional details. Those would provide a lot of insight for all. Thanks for that input.

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Treasure Coast/St Lucie/Martin County, FL

24.56 base + 2.50-6.25 differential

3 years RN/ASN degree

Med Surg Onc

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Specializes in GENERAL.
greenerpastures said:
Treasure Coast/St Lucie/Martin County, FL

24.56 base + 2.50-6.25 differential

3 years RN/ASN degree

Med Surg Onc

Medical College of Georgia/ Augusta,GA *(1988)

$25.00 Nights-Weekends, No Diff, No Benefits- "Baylor Plan"

2 years RN/BSN

Surgical ICU, Open Heart Recovery, Trauma Overflow

$25.00 in 1988 valuation adjusted for the rate of inflation in today's money is $51.24.

I'll let you come to your own conclusions.

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I find those numbers for New York fairly low..

Cochran School of nursing, associate degree

Telemetry ICCU,

Base salary $42.14/HR + $3.07/hr night dif.

Full med & dental benefits.. At no cost, and pension at no cost.

Been on job for 2 months

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The only thing I found interesting about these stats are that male nurses make a lot more money than female nurses holding the same position with advanced degrees. Another interesting factor, which I already had an idea of, was that in order to be competitive in the job market one must hold an advanced degree beyond a BSN.

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Would it be possible to add a breakdown of pay by specialty? Or are the results ambiguous as many hospitals pay similarly for different specialties or pay only slightly more? Relevant information can help with a career choice, particularly if you end up in a more market based environment than staff nursing such as travel contracts.

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CCC Flagstaff, AZ

Behavioral Health Unit

Base $27.50 + differential and Holidays

Health Insurance

3 months(New Grad) RN-ADN

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I would like to know what each state makes broken down by specialty.. For example, Florida average ER salary compared to NY. This will help people know what to expect or negotiate for future jobs.

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Jay-T said:
I would like to know what each state makes broken down by specialty.. For example, Florida average ER salary compared to NY. This will help people know what to expect or negotiate for future jobs.

I don't believe the information requested will be accurate. 1,158 survey responders worked in the ED. Divide that into 55 US BON jurisdictions (plus another half dozen Canadian ones) or around 20 per each one.

In actuality, more survey responders will be in the more populous states meaning a very low sample size per smaller state. All it would take is for a couple more senior nurses in one small BON area to completely change compensation results. Compensation in hospitals is heavily weighted by years of experience, with the specialty carrying much less weight.

I recommend simply using the state average pay to get an idea of the difference in pay in any specialty as you will now have 18,800 data points divided up by jurisdictions. Even that is not enough data points for a really accurate picture. You will see many posts in this thread saying that each state number is too high or too low. I believe the census bureau has nurse pay broken down by state and city.

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Specializes in CGRN.
rollernurse said:
I find those numbers for New York fairly low..

Cochran School of nursing, associate degree

Telemetry ICCU,

Base salary $42.14/HR + $3.07/hr night dif.

Full med & dental benefits.. At no cost, and pension at no cost.

Been on job for 2 months

Well I believe us upstate people are weighing the averages down... The base pay in my hospital is $24/hr and there are area hospitals that pay even less.

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