Compensation ?...

I've not found that trend in most of my career, either. The Peds nurses are generally paid at the same rate as everyone else.

However, I do know of a few instances where certain "hard-to-fill" specialties receive bonus pay and have never known Peds to be included in that bonus. That makes the Peds nurses paid less than a few select specialties, but not "all of nursing in general," if you know what I mean.

You have to remember that salaries are set based in part on "supply and demand" priniciples -- not on the principles of "who knows the most" or "who works the hardes" etc. If positions are hard to fill (such as nights, weekends, holidays, etc.) there are pay incentives to encourage people to work those shifts. The same goes for certain specialties. Sometimes, when a hospital has trouble recruiting or retaining nurses in a certain specialty, it will offer a bonus or salary increase to encourage nurses to want to work on those units. Peds is usually one the most popular specialties -- which doesn't give hospitals the need to pay special bonuses or higher salaries for Peds nurses.

It's also been my experience over the years that nurses in the different clinical areas are paid about the same (within a given hospital). As the others noted, if there are significant differences, it's often because those particular positions are harder to fill and there is greater demand. If it's v. easy for hospitals to fill positions in a particular area (e.g., peds), there's no need for them to offer the higher salary rates that they may need to offer in other areas.

Not here. We don't even get extra pay for working ICU or Emergency.