Are state benefits really all it's cracked up to be?

[Livingdeadnurse]

So I currently work in an privately owned hospital in the ER. I was offered a state job at the local mental health institution in virginia. Everyone keeps say omg state benefits are great. Anyone know more specifics on why?

[Livingdeadnurse]

Burnt out in the ER. They are pushing so much more for so much less. Less staff, less money, unsafe conditions. All the other facilities get critical care time but us. Yet we have more patient flow and still have high acuity patients. They also have the mind set that if we have 29 beds in the Er we aren't full in the hospital till they are full. Meaning 4-5 nurses could potential have an unsafe amount of overflow admission patients plus still have Er patients. Those over flow patients could be Ccu, Pcu, tele, or med surge. We have no ratio in the ER. Rarely do we go on diversion. Not that it stops the patients from coming in the front. While doing charge nurse. I was triage nurse, charge and had 7 ER patients. I love being an ER nurse. But I can only be stretched so far,

[caliotter3]

Have never known anyone who worked for the government to complain about the benefits.

[firstinfamily, RN]

I have never worked as a state employee but have several family members who do and did. My parents both retired with state benefits and those benefits are seeing to their healthcare, medications etc. They rarely have out of pocket expenses. My close nurse friend left the acute care environment and went into state nursing at a public school. She loves it, the pay is not great, but the benefits are wonderful and they cover all of her health expenses. As far as the benefits remaining "X" said it best as new contracts are negotiated every so often, my brother in law is a retired teacher and had his retirement benefits reduced because of the contract negotiations. state and federal jobs use to be the "safe" place to go, they are not so much any more. Still, the benefits are most likely worth it, and it is true, there must be a state holiday just about every month!!! Go For IT!!

[amoLucia]

Re holidays 'every month' - don't know if it's still the same, but where I was we had 'Black Friday" (day after Thanksgiving). This was usually a governor-declared holiday (altho once in a while, gov delined), election days and the gov was freq delclaring 'snow holidays. February was the BEST month for holidays, November was second. And the 3 personal days - they could be used for those unexpected emergencies that would come up suddenly. And nobody could be questioned or penalized for using them!

I was the only Nursing title in my dept. So I got a uniform allowance even though we all wore street clothes in my dept.

We had a STRONG union. Union reps were always there for support. I believed that even the Pope couldn't get someone fired if you were permanent in your title. You were a "lifer'.

I will acknowledge that benefits in some states have drifted downwardly so, yes, you should check out what the benefits are in your state.

[xenogenetic]

One thing nice about my state is that you get *full* health benefits even if you are a part-time state employee with hours between 17.5 to 32 per week. A hybrid employment strategy that I am going to initiate soon to maximize my income is to lateral transfer into a 17.5 or 20 hour per week state job on an off shift and then secure a 32-40 hour job in the private sector. This will give me the best of both worlds of current state benefits (although accrual will be slower) along with the higher pay of a per diem/locum private job. I had dropped down to 20 hours years ago for a short time while in nursing school and worked out well.

[NickiLaughs, ADN, BSN, RN]

Burnt out in the ER. They are pushing so much more for so much less. Less staff, less money, unsafe conditions. All the other facilities get critical care time but us. Yet we have more patient flow and still have high acuity patients. They also have the mind set that if we have 29 beds in the Er we aren't full in the hospital till they are full. Meaning 4-5 nurses could potential have an unsafe amount of overflow admission patients plus still have Er patients. Those over flow patients could be Ccu, Pcu, tele, or med surge. We have no ratio in the ER. Rarely do we go on diversion. Not that it stops the patients from coming in the front. While doing charge nurse. I was triage nurse, charge and had 7 ER patients. I love being an ER nurse. But I can only be stretched so far,

wow, how do you even physically do that? Yeah I'd quit. Take the government job, evenif you don't like psych, it might give you the recip you need and hopefully other options.