Asking a higher rate

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Is it acceptable for a travel nurse working an assignment in places such as San Francisco, or Boston, to ask for an hourly rate that is at least on par with what the staff RN's make?

I see contracts advertised with hourly rates far less than what staff makes… around the $40 range, when I know the staff make up to $15-20 more an hour.

Is that asking too much?

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Yes. If you want a staff job with no housing, tax benefits and so on, take a staff job! Pay rates for travelers are sometimes higher, and sometimes lower and that is just how it works. Housing in the Bay area might be as much as $3,000 a month. If you take that out of staff pay, travel pay may be equivalent.

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No it's not! I'm going through the same thing. I told my company nevermind. I would find a perm position in CA because I refuse to be a traveler and make less than perm staff. I swear it's like pulling teeth to get a decent wage these day. And yes Ned. I work with multiple agencies. Lol!

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While I'm on my way to work at an assignment in California that pays more than staff, that is highly unusual and is a rapid response crisis situation. Generally, you will get a lower hourly. So tell me, when you get paid more than staff, do you refuse, or distribute the money among the staff? I'm kidding of course, but physicians get paid more too, and there is nothing you can do about that either. If a job in California pays more than one you can find anywhere else, what does it matter what staff gets paid? You will work for less somewhere else just because?

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I don't necessarily care about hourly rate. I'm talking total package with all tax free incentives. If its less than I can make as a perm staff on the same floor I'm not doing it. I just got an offer $41/hr per cal. I know perm nurse same hospital start at $45. Per diem starts $51. They say some assignments are destination assignment others are money assignments. I say screw that. Even on a destination assignment I still gotta eat. Guess I need to practice my pole skills. Nurse by day. Stripper by night. Lol!

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Back in the day travel nurses made bank in CA. Now they barely make what perm staff make. But it is CA!

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Specializes in PCT, RN.
Guess I need to practice my pole skills. Nurse by day. Stripper by night. Lol!

Omg hahahaha :roflmao:

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You have to look hard for a travel assignment in California with total pay per PanTravelers calculator paying only $41 an hour. That is low.

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a rapid response crisis situation.

Ned, how do you find these

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This time was really random. I clicked a link accidentally on a jobs site and the most recent post was this assignment. I wasn't even planning on working this summer. It was a place I wanted to work anyway and a personal best rate (which is saying something) so that upturned my summer plans. For several reasons, I was a near optimal candidate. In another bit of random luck, the director and I crossed paths twenty years ago on my first travel assignment. So we yakked about the staff there.

So you can insert almost any idiom here about life happening!

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Congrats. Maybe specializing in OR is something I should really look into. ;)

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OR is still not L&D but I've been seeing a lot of extreme rates as travel goes crazy. It is hard to outsource nursing and even harder to increase OR patient ratios! I heard an interesting story on NPR today about virtualizing ICUs. But that appears to increase the need for local staff and helps stabilize smaller hospitals.

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