No Nursing Shortage At The Present Time

Despite rampant claims of a critical nursing shortage, many cities and states in the US are actually suffering from the opposite problem: a surplus of nurses. The intended purpose of this article is to challenge the widespread belief that a current nursing shortage exists. Nurses Announcements Archive Article

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ctmed

316 Posts

Specializes in PACU, LTC, Med-Surg, Telemetry, Psych.
Have you heard of the 'crabs in a barrel' phenomenon, also known as the crab mentality?

Live crabs can be left in open barrels because, as one crab climbs toward the top to escape, the other crabs will grab on and pull it back. In summary, all of the crabs end up with the same fate.

The 'crabs in a barrel' story is a metaphor for human behavior because, as one person attempts to better themselves, strive for self-improvement, or leave his/her current situation, sometimes the others around him/her (a.k.a. the crabs) latch on and try to hold the person back.

Click on the link below if you wish to read more about the phenomenon. It is more common than anyone has ever imagined.

https://allnurses.com/general-nursing-student/crabs-in-barrel-758617.html

That is a very insightful way of looking at it I never thought about. I actually ended up quitting my job over just that. Other things, too. The facility really was falling apart with no supplies and nasty people. I was getting really snide comments as in "Therapy is a small field. You are going to be blackballed so you better worry about YOUR JOB first!", or "Occupational Therapists hate CNAs, even if you think you are going to go work across the river!" or "You do not know any of those guys and they only know you as a CNA and OTs only hire thier own "kind", you are going to fail."

Or, my favorite from my CNA supervisor, "So, you lied. You are only here till you hopefully get your lisc. and leave. Not sure why we hired you. We had 15 applications from those who were willing to concentrate as a CNA". DUH! Like I really want to be only wiping behind and being completely unfullfilled and having to implement stuff I have no say so in the REST of MY LIFE! Please, shoot me now if that is all that life has for me to be ordered around by those who do not give 2 flips except they do not want to see brown or yellow substances ever or want you to deal with the complaints. As a COTA, I will have no problems with pee or poo. Hell, I may be that 70 year old. But, I do not want to be the one standing there waiting for 8 hours just in case they poo and it is the only thing I am there for besides feeding, bathing, or clothing. How unchallenging.

It's like sheesh. It is season here in New Orleans. I think it is going to be better for my mental health to work temp agencies and on call banquets during school. I was also starting to halfway believe some of the propoganda. Sad, too. I like scrubs and hate full tuxes. I like dealing with patients. But, this school is going to be no joke. Having to work and do this is going take every fibre of my being and I really do not want to have to be worried about another 5 other crab's pinchers putting me back in the barrel. I want to swim free in the ocean. Not end up in a nursing home owner's stomach so they can live an upper class lifestyle while I stress over rent or beg to keep my job.

Sorry for the OT rant. That phenomenom is real. And you know what, I am sure right after I got out of that office they got on the phone to 10 other CNAs who would do backflips to take my spot. So, they did not care.

ctmed

316 Posts

Specializes in PACU, LTC, Med-Surg, Telemetry, Psych.
There maybe more postings but are they hiring?

Some of these job posts are just there because I think it is a policy they have to list it even though it is probably filled within an hour. Particularly what I call on forums "lay out" jobs.

For example, with CNAs. I have seen many hospital job listings for things like ICU, PACU, clinics, etc. However, I have actually worked in a hospital and know better. Someone already working there is going to apply for that job. If they have been there a certain amount of time and have no write ups and have the blessing of the managers, they are going to get it. It is a 50 times better job than say, working geri psych or telemetry which at times is just a higher class nursing home with more gadgets and not having to dress folks as much. Not to say it is a bad job compared to others out there.

I meet the experience requirements for those jobs and have applied for them. But follow up with HR always yeilds a "we gave that to an internal employee." Even within a day of it being posted.

So why list it? I would say a good 20m to 40 percent of postings are these. I mean CNA for anesthesia tech. My goodness, how many CNAs would sell off a relative for that. Most of the time, that is already filled before it is posted.

EDIT:

One more point I wanted to make. It is not common in the medical field, but very well could get to that point. In IT, there are what they call "non-jobs". What these corporations do is they must list the job to satisfy certain requirements. However, they already know who they are going to hire. They want someone from India who has H1B with 2 Masters Degrees they can pay a quarter of the prevailing wages. If questioned, they will say there is a "shortage" because no American could meet the high requirements. Never mind the position is a help desk phone job and could be done adequately with some on the job training, a little experience, and an AAS degree!

However, didn't we hear a bit earlier about foriegn RNs? I also read something lond time ago about illegal immigrant CNAs! Particularly in union states like NV!

Piglet08

153 Posts

There's no nursing shortage. There was a "shortage" of nurses willing to accept whatever pay and conditions an employer deigned to offer; however, with all those new grads in dire straits with nursing school loans and no job, that situation is changing. Corporate America doesn't care how many people it has to put into debt as long as it can reduce its expenses.

I would tell anyone considering nursing school now to NOT do it unless they already work in a medical setting and have assurance of a job when they graduate.

TheCommuter, BSN, RN

102 Articles; 27,612 Posts

Specializes in Case mgmt., rehab, (CRRN), LTC & psych.
Also in job postings for June 2012, Registered Nurses by far took the lead in job postings with a 22.8% increase from last year at 246,322 jobs posted total ( Registered Nurses – Jobs. Trends. Insight. ).

Maybe in some areas it's saturated with nurses but evidently not everywhere. I can only imagine jobs becoming more available with time as there was a 22.8% increase in rn job postings from a year ago.

Job postings do not necessarily represent real jobs behind those postings. For example, my workplace always has RN job postings due to policy, although they never truly intend to hire anyone.

Human resources personnel at many hospitals and other types of healthcare facilities must post job openings externally. This is because their policies require that every position be posted and that a specific number of applicants are to be granted interviews. However, HR managers frequently hire no external candidates for these posted jobs due to many reasons. Often, the budget does not realistically allow the addition of a new hire.

Sometimes, HR saves these posted positions for internal applicants who have expressed interest. In other words, even though someone's favorite hospital has numerous postings for RN positions, it does not mean that the HR folks are actually doing any serious hiring.

ThePrincessBride, MSN, RN, NP

1 Article; 2,594 Posts

Specializes in Med-Surg, NICU.
That is a very insightful way of looking at it I never thought about. I actually ended up quitting my job over just that. Other things, too. The facility really was falling apart with no supplies and nasty people. I was getting really snide comments as in "Therapy is a small field. You are going to be blackballed so you better worry about YOUR JOB first!", or "Occupational Therapists hate CNAs, even if you think you are going to go work across the river!" or "You do not know any of those guys and they only know you as a CNA and OTs only hire thier own "kind", you are going to fail."

Or, my favorite from my CNA supervisor, "So, you lied. You are only here till you hopefully get your lisc. and leave. Not sure why we hired you. We had 15 applications from those who were willing to concentrate as a CNA". DUH! Like I really want to be only wiping behind and being completely unfullfilled and having to implement stuff I have no say so in the REST of MY LIFE! Please, shoot me now if that is all that life has for me to be ordered around by those who do not give 2 flips except they do not want to see brown or yellow substances ever or want you to deal with the complaints. As a COTA, I will have no problems with pee or poo. Hell, I may be that 70 year old. But, I do not want to be the one standing there waiting for 8 hours just in case they poo and it is the only thing I am there for besides feeding, bathing, or clothing. How unchallenging.

It's like sheesh. It is season here in New Orleans. I think it is going to be better for my mental health to work temp agencies and on call banquets during school. I was also starting to halfway believe some of the propoganda. Sad, too. I like scrubs and hate full tuxes. I like dealing with patients. But, this school is going to be no joke. Having to work and do this is going take every fibre of my being and I really do not want to have to be worried about another 5 other crab's pinchers putting me back in the barrel. I want to swim free in the ocean. Not end up in a nursing home owner's stomach so they can live an upper class lifestyle while I stress over rent or beg to keep my job.

Sorry for the OT rant. That phenomenom is real. And you know what, I am sure right after I got out of that office they got on the phone to 10 other CNAs who would do backflips to take my spot. So, they did not care.

What a condescending post, and this is coming from someone who works as a PCA (equivalent to a CNA). "Not fulfilling"?"Shoot me"? "Wiping behind"? (as if RNs NEVER have to wipe a patient's bottom). Only there for "feeding, bathing, and clothing"? "Unchallenging?" (Not even a word, btw).

With your mentality, you have no business setting foot in nursing school. If you think being an CNA is "unchallenging" (lmao), I would suggest choosing a different field altogether. Being a CNA is VERY hard work and back breaking labor, and it is very challenging. We don't just "feed, bathe and clothe" patients, or at least not where I work. I am helping RNs ALL the time, I have ten (sometimes more) patients, and my ankles kill me at the end of my shift.

How dare you look down on the very people who will help you as a nurse. I certainly wouldn't want to work with someone like you.

allnurses Guide

nursel56

7,078 Posts

Specializes in Peds/outpatient FP,derm,allergy/private duty.
The Bureau of Labor statistics states for registered nurses the expected job growth for 2010-2020 is 26% thus faster than average ( Registered Nurses : Occupational Outlook Handbook : U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics ). Also in job postings for June 2012, Registered Nurses by far took the lead in job postings with a 22.8% increase from last year at 246,322 jobs posted total ( Registered Nurses - Jobs. Trends. Insight. ).

Maybe in some areas it's saturated with nurses but evidently not everywhere. I can only imagine jobs becoming more available with time as there was a 22.8% increase in rn job postings from a year ago.

Once you get past the truth that a want ad posted doesn't always mean there's a vacancy they are just hoping they can fill, you need to rigorously analyze the sources of information you use to support your position. What is "wanted analytics"? It's a company that gathers data by surveying online advertising only. It may be a publication of an organization with a political agenda. There are many very legitimate looking websites that are in reality a front for a profit-making venture of some kind.

In the link you provided, it stated that the increase in want ads was mostly from staffing and recruitment agencies, and that job opening postings by direct hire institutions have remained stable. Staffing and recruitment companies lose nothing by adding people to their rolls, because they aren't actual jobs.

I read fairly often in the mainstream media (who only represent one side of the story) that areas of the country, especially rural areas are "begging for nurses". Where?

Just today we had two simultaneous news stories that put what is happening in stark relief. NPR on "Talk of the Nation" did a show about the crisis of the shortage of doctors and nurses. A call came in from a new nurse named Marcus saying he could not find a job and neither could many of his classmates, wondering why he kept being told it was a secure field and . . they basically had nothing to say. He mentioned that he lived in Iowa. They thanked him for the call and hung up.

Then I ran across another story, also from Iowa, where the reporter stated, " (the nursing student) is close to graduation and that's good because across the nation, there is a critical need for more nurses."

Now I admit I'm not a journalism expert, but this instance is very blatant.

Now to the talk about HCR creating millions of new jobs, baby boomer nurses both retiring and getting old and therefore needing more healthcare is speculation. You'll notice the powers that be love to throw numbers around when it comes to the impending catastrophe of the crisis in the nursing workforce, yet strangely vague when it comes to what impact healthcare reform, the baby-boomers, etc etc aka "talking points" you hear repeated until you want to scream.

story one:

Prognosis Worsens For Shortages In Primary Care : NPR

story two:

http://www.ktiv.com/story/19220319/the-nursing-shortage-could-be-even-more-serious-as-the-health-care-law-goes-into-effect

Eventually, people will start to spout the "crisis" media strategy and the room will burst out in laughter. It always takes longer for the truth to work it's way up, but it will.

joanna73, BSN, RN

4,767 Posts

Specializes in geriatrics.
I am assured that some of you are reading this and saying to yourselves, "Duh! This topic is old hat. We already know there's a glut of nurses in many parts of the country, so why are you writing about this?"Here is my reason for writing about the current surplus of nurses in local employment markets. I entered the term 'nursing shortage' into a popular search engine and yielded nearly 720,000 results. Afterward, I searched for the phrase 'no nursing shortage' using the same search engine and received about 59,000 results. Since the loud warnings of a dire nursing shortage are being hollered everywhere, I am going to do my part and shout some information that contradicts these claims. Hospitals began experiencing a shortage of nurses in 1998, according to the American Hospital Association in 2002 (Ostrow, 2012). Colleges and universities aggressively responded to this shortage by expanding their existing nursing programs and/or starting new schools of nursing. Johnson & Johnson started an ad campaign to entice more people into the profession. Healthcare facilities responded to the shortage by offering more perks such as tuition reimbursement and scholarships to current employees.Well, those efforts to increase the total number of nurses in the US have been wildly successful. The number of full-time nurses grew by about 386,000 from 2005 to 2010 and about a third of the growth occurred as unemployment rose to a high of 10 percent during that period, according to a report published in the New England Journal of Medicine (Ostrow, 2012). But still, the study raises an intriguing question: How did the nation go from a shortage to, if not a surplus, then at least an apparently adequate supply of nurses? (Rovner, 2011).The federal government helped by increasing the funding for nursing programs to a whopping $240 million, up from $80 million in 2001. The proliferation of accelerated bachelor of science in nursing (BSN) degree programs and direct-entry master of science in nursing (MSN) degree programs also contributed to the rapid increase in the number of new nurses because students who hold non-nursing degrees can complete these training programs in 12 to 18 months.The slumping economic situation in the US also contributed to the easing of the nursing shortage. Seasoned nurses are not retiring because many saw their retirement funds dwindle during the economic crisis of 2008. Other nurses have become breadwinners and accepted full-time positions once their spouses were laid off during the Great Recession. Some nurses are coming out of retirement and reactivating their nursing licenses. Moreover, masses of people lost health insurance benefits after becoming unemployed, which leads to reduced patient census in places that provide nursing care.Thirty-six percent of nursing graduates in the class of 2011 had not secured positions as registered nurses (RNs) as of last fall, according to a survey conducted by the National Student Nurses' Association in September (Griswold, 2012). Of course, some states are afflicted with a worse glut of nurses than others. More than four out of ten (43 percent) of California nurses, who were newly licensed as registered nurses in the previous 18 months, say they could not find a job, according to a recent survey paid for by the California Institute for Nursing & Health Care (CVBT, 2012).Experts predict that a nursing shortage will peak in the US in 2020. While these projections may turn out to be accurate, keep in mind that this country is continually producing record numbers of new nurses each year. Still, the nursing shortage of the late 1990s appears to have eased.
Interesting statistics. While there certainly is no shortage now, it's unfortunate that we aren't being proactive. Within the next 10 years, once people retire in record numbers and continue to access more health services, nursing could become a disaster. The fact is, nurses are working short in most facilities. All these unemployed and underemployed nurses will leave the profession, but when the time comes, we're going to need them.

CrunchRN, ADN, RN

4,530 Posts

Specializes in Clinical Research, Outpt Women's Health.

Many have no savings. I doubt they will retire in the expected numbers no matter how much they want to.

TheCommuter, BSN, RN

102 Articles; 27,612 Posts

Specializes in Case mgmt., rehab, (CRRN), LTC & psych.
Many have no savings. I doubt they will retire in the expected numbers no matter how much they want to.
Yes. I've previously mentioned that one-third of Baby Boomers have no (a.k.a. zero) retirement money saved, so I fully expect this subset of the population to continue working until the day they die.

Since there's approximately 78 million Baby Boomers in the US, this would mean that 26 million middle-aged people have no retirement money whatsoever. Although it is true that these people are going to need healthcare and eventually die off in the next few decades, how are their medical bills going to be paid without some major strain on the system?

Specializes in Trauma.
Interesting statistics. While there certainly is no shortage now, it's unfortunate that we aren't being proactive. Within the next 10 years, once people retire in record numbers and continue to access more health services, nursing could become a disaster. The fact is, nurses are working short in most facilities. All these unemployed and underemployed nurses will leave the profession, but when the time comes, we're going to need them.

Yes, IF nurses start retiring in droves like expected there will be massive shortages nationwide. The problem is careers are not like paper towels, You can't train up a bunch of people then put them away until needed. The leaving and training needs to happen simultaneously.

I used to think that all schools should be required to post the employment numbers of their grads. What percentage of their grads got jobs in their field of training within 6 months of graduation. Then I remembered that people often times believe what they want to believe regardless of what they are told.

Tragically Hip

267 Posts

Yes, too many people externalize the blame for their own personal faults, poor decisions, and shortcomings. Personal responsibility seems to have been thrown out of the window in favor of the 'poor little me, woe is me' outlook on life.

More people must face the music and be accountable when something goes wrong in their lives. Whatever happened to due diligence?

I have a big issue with schools lying about how easy it is to get a job in the "rapidly expanding field of nursing," even in areas where it's very difficult for a new grad to find employment. It's fraudulent. My college did not try to pull the wool over our eyes (at least, not at orientation, after we were already in :uhoh3:). But I also have a problem with people who are willing to devote several years of their lives, and in the process take on a lot of debt, without doing any research at all as to career prospects.

Patti_RN

353 Posts

Specializes in ..

Even if nurses retire en masse in 10 to 15 years, that will do nothing for those who who graduated recently but still have not found jobs. A nursing degree has a shelf life and is perishable if unused. Managers want fresh, new grads with recent clincial experiences and while all the nursing information is fresh in their minds. When given a choice between a recent grad or someone who graduated 18 months ago but has never worked, most often the new grad will get the job.

Nursing schools are typically distinct organizations and usually not connected with hospitals as many had been in the past. The are a business, like retail stores or service industries. In order to survive and be profitable they need to attract paying customers. While it may be unethical to tell perspective students that jobs are easy to find and that there is a nursing shortage, it's no more unusual than a fast food company promoting a dressing laden cheeseburger as healthy food.

Students continue to flock to nursing school, even though many know that the 'nursing shortage' isn't a reality. They each believe they will be the exception and land a great, well-paying nursing job. I've read many posts on this site from graduates who have either given up or are about to give up after looking for a year or two (sometimes more) without as much as an interview. This is not the promise that was made by the nursing school, but it's certainly the reality of the situation.