Ethics: Does it bother you when people are in nursing to make money?

RNsRWe, ASN, RN · Nov 30, 2007

You know, I was scanning down the list of topics, and read the title of this thread again. And it made me think of a fast response: "does it bother you when people are in medical school to make money?". How about "Does it bother you when people are in dental school to make money?".

Probably already been mentioned before, but still....

SarasotaRN2b · Nov 30, 2007

Ok OK you have a very good point EG! We earn what we justly deserve in salary; some of us think otherwise...that MDs earn exponentially more than us and that's just not fair.
Does it bother you when someone comes to work, sits on there ass, complains about patient's in an unprofessional manner, gripes about pay, appears to have more interests in how well the Starbucks stock is doing than doing the tasks, the nursing process at hand or being even an inkling of the best nurse that they can be?

I don't want to get in the whole doctors vs. nurses...just wanted to say that there training alone is probably triple what a RN requires (BSN prepared).

Yes, it is bothersome...but I must say that the majority of the nurses I've worked with are constantly on the go.

I am going into nursing because of my interest in medicine and being an advocate for my patients...but, I'm also doing it because I know that it is a career that will provide me with a good living and hopefully a good retirement.

Kris

banditrn · Nov 30, 2007

This thread reminds me of studies that have been done on cognitive dissonance and careers.
You know - the studies go something like this: 20 participants are paid $5 to do a boring and unpleasant task (rated boring and unpleasant by overwhelming margins in other samples) and then they fill out a survey regarding the meaning and level of enjoyment. 20 other participants do the exact same task, but they are paid $50, and then they fill out the same survey regarding the boring/unpleasant task.
Who rates their boring/unpleasant level most accurately? The higher paid group. This has been duplicated many, many times. It is cognitive dissonance regarding work. The lower paid group will always rank their task as quite meaningful, etc. The mind has to inject the perception of extra meaning to explain why we would do such things for low pay/bad treatment.
When people are paid fairly and treated well, they tend to perceive their conditions more accurately.
I would think this could have implications for nursing. Anytime I hear nursing related as a 'calling' by someone I think of this. Savvy and scheming leaders know that the way to get someone to work harder for them is to treat them poorly and pay them little. The worker will respond with cognitive dissonance and unconsciously attach extra meaning to their work to bridge the dissonance and work harder.
Many people leading large groups know this. Religious leaders know this, and so do political leaders, etc. I think of this sometimes when I read about nursing being a 'calling' and all of the halo 'angels of mercy' stuff.

Double post, sorry.

banditrn · Nov 30, 2007

This thread reminds me of studies that have been done on cognitive dissonance and careers.
You know - the studies go something like this: 20 participants are paid $5 to do a boring and unpleasant task (rated boring and unpleasant by overwhelming margins in other samples) and then they fill out a survey regarding the meaning and level of enjoyment. 20 other participants do the exact same task, but they are paid $50, and then they fill out the same survey regarding the boring/unpleasant task.
Who rates their boring/unpleasant level most accurately? The higher paid group. This has been duplicated many, many times. It is cognitive dissonance regarding work. The lower paid group will always rank their task as quite meaningful, etc. The mind has to inject the perception of extra meaning to explain why we would do such things for low pay/bad treatment.
When people are paid fairly and treated well, they tend to perceive their conditions more accurately.
I would think this could have implications for nursing. Anytime I hear nursing related as a 'calling' by someone I think of this. Savvy and scheming leaders know that the way to get someone to work harder for them is to treat them poorly and pay them little. The worker will respond with cognitive dissonance and unconsciously attach extra meaning to their work to bridge the dissonance and work harder.
Many people leading large groups know this. Religious leaders know this, and so do political leaders, etc. I think of this sometimes when I read about nursing being a 'calling' and all of the halo 'angels of mercy' stuff.

That IS very interesting. I've worked with people over the years that almost seemed as tho they ENJOYED being mistreated. :confused: I don't care for those types, and can't understand what they get from it. Especially the ones that want to run to you and complain, yet they will do nothing but take it some more.

After listening to them the first time or two, then I tell them to either do something about it or stop bringing it up.

jtski908 · Nov 30, 2007

I was a fire fighter medic in the USAF and the whole, "service before self" issue was pushed ad nauseum.

The poster was correct that the lower paying jobs that require the most personal sacrifice seem to have a type of super significance attached to the service (I guess so people will do those jobs).

Here's one: I have been a police officer for almost 20 years (I am about to retire and start a second career as an RN-gladly so, I might add).

Over the years, I have watched as person after person have paid officers/firefighters/medics etc, VERBAL compliment after compliment. BUT, when it comes time to pony up for more cops or ffers or medics for better pay, or better pension, or to make these types of jobs safer, or to address the issue of retention, or hiring better qualified people, nothing but excuses and lies.

To the nurses: be glad the majority of nurses do not work in a city or state type setting.

When I leave my "popo" job, and finish my RN program, I will start out my first year as an RN, higher than I topped out as as a police officer.

I am going into nursing because the money is good (esp coupled with my pension). But, I am not doing completely for the money. I like to help people. I like to make a difference (small or large as that may be).

BUT, I also like the fact I'll have more money to take care of my wife and our 3 and a half month old son (who is starting to smile at daddy every time he sees daddy) :)

showbizrn · Dec 2, 2007

JUST FOR THE MONEY with safe, ethical nursing practice doesn't bother me.

My interest is patient safety.

Any other concern is none of my business...people enter professions for their own reasons.

Leave well enough alone. :nono:

EmmaG, RN · Dec 2, 2007

"If nurses weren't supposed to have knowledge, they were supposed to have virtues. Lots of them, in fact: 'In the economy of nature,' the Lancet explained, 'the ministry of women is one of help and sympathy. The essential principle, the key-note of her work in the world is aid; to sustain, succour, revive, and even sometimes shelter, man in the struggle and duty of life, is her peculiar function.'

Women were supposed to be 'efficient providers of care,' who pursued 'higher incentives to activity, zeal, and faithfulness than the mere earning of wages.' The French reformer Bourneville extolled [nurses] training schools that taught moral refinement and 'feminine tenderness of spirit' and that 'furnish personnel with the same guarantees (as religious orders) of aptitude and devotion.'

What better way to obtain cheap labor than to instill in nurses the view that they should sacrifice their material needs to a higher mission or calling?" --- Suzanne Gordon, Nursing Against the Odds

'nuf said...

wooh, BSN, RN · Dec 2, 2007

What better way to obtain cheap labor than to instill in nurses the view that they should sacrifice their material needs to a higher mission or calling?" --- Suzanne Gordon, Nursing Against the Odds

Not just cheap labor. But the whole "virtuous calling" is what allows our "customers" to treat us like crap without repercussions. After all, they're sick and if we were good virtuous nurses we'd understand that instead of demanding respect.

EmmaG, RN · Dec 2, 2007

Not just cheap labor. But the whole "virtuous calling" is what allows our "customers" to treat us like crap without repercussions. After all, they're sick and if we were good virtuous nurses we'd understand that instead of demanding respect.

Oooo, good point. Not only our "customers", but doctors, administration, families and the public in general...

leslie :-D · Dec 2, 2007

Oooo, good point. Not only our "customers", but doctors, administration, families and the public in general...

and ooooooooooh, the look in their eyes, when they see what b*tches we can be... :devil:

take THAT, dagnabit!!

leslie

lamazeteacher · Dec 3, 2007

goss = gossip. Although just to make it very clear I am a huge keeper of secrets. Pt. confidentiality and all that. my husband is always getting up me because his friend will be in at work and he doesn't find out untill they are out again and telling him that I looked after them. Goss is no fun if you have to share it anyway, you get a certain satisfaction knowing what others don't...or is that just my twisted way of looking at the world?

For those who also didn't get the meaning of "getting up me", it means "upset". One of my favorite British/Australianisms, is being told by someone that they "knocked (someone) up", which means they went to someone's home and knocked on their door.........

When I've been told by a non caregiver, that I'm bright and asked why I wasn't a doctor, I usually say that I love nursing, and wouldn't be happy in an office most of the day, seeing too many patients to be half way effective in their care. Of course what these (?well meaning) peoplke meant was that I could have earned more money.

It's well known that many doctors are "in it for the money", as they have made piles of it. Their assertion that they deserve so much is because they have so many (more) years of training, gives one pause. Their training was 4 years in University as an undergraduate taking lots of science and math classes (having graduated at the top of their classes) and done something medically purposeful while there (to influence the medical school's admissions department), then 4 years in medical school, 1 year as an intern, and a couple more years as a resident. Then they had to pay off their student debts if their families weren't wealthy enough to pay for it all. So they have 7 years more education than a 4 year University trained Registered Nurse, or 11 years

more than a 2 year grad from Junior College Nursing programs.

So a new grad makes something between $25 - $30/ hour, and a newly installed physician makes $100,000 - $200,000/year, working possibly a 50 hour week in group practise (stay with me as I go to calculator), which came out as $57.80/hour, when I averaged the first year's pay at $150,000. - Twice that, approximately, of the highest paid non travellor Nurse.

While the Nurse slaves away for years (say 30), and earns maybe twice what she got as a new grad, the doctor parlays his/her salary up to $500,000 yearly in an HMO, or over $1,000,000 yearly working in a large city, especially one that's warm most of the year. The Nurse then makes $150,000 (hopefully), with experience that puts his/her time in her/his profession close to that of a younger MD, who spends less time with individual patients. So in order to treat the patient best, he/she relies on Nurses' observations of his/her patient.

The drift of the above cost analysis indicates that a physician must rely on someone's information, who makes 1/5th to 1/10th the salary he/she does, to adequately treat said patient. When Nurse Practitioners work for doctors, they get a bigger piece of the pie, but not substantially greater, and they prescribe and spend more time with individual patients. Does anyone else see something wrong with that picture? That is, if one believes that Nurses work more for the money than the joy of it all? Is it any wonder that 5/6 of my Nursing class didn't work in Nursing 10 years after graduation? How about yours?

Without adequate/appropriate compensation, burn out rates are higher. The more emotional investment one has in others, without substantial appreciation, the higher the burn out rate. The more tedious the work is (like increased repetitive paperwork), the less satisfaction one gets out of it, and the more likely it is that other occupations attract them. So is it any wonder that there is a crisis in Nursing, caused by too few people in it?

I don't think getting less trained people in to do the less skilled work is the answer, as that puts Nurses further from the patient, and therefore less likely to know what's going on with them, or intervene when things go wrong......in order to give good care. Is anyone else scared about becoming a patient these days, or in the future?:uhoh21:

manofcare · Dec 4, 2007

I'm not really sure why this question is so recurrent in the field. I also suspect that this thinking is, no offense, primarily feminine in nature. Don't think that I didn't feel secure when my mom nurtured and loved me. I love women for what and who they are.Do NOT jump to conclusions yet, please. The femininzation of a job or skill results in a decrease in wages. The nursing field has been viewed as a pink collar job for years, and with that view salaries will be lower as long as that view is held. Until nurses understand that they would leave the bedside when the paychecks stopped coming in, and lose the view that they are there for only an altruistic reason, do not expect value compensation. I feel called to nursing. I prayed long and hard before I left a business I had started, and built for 20+ years to change fields. I did not only consider money. In all honesty. The pay is not as good as some think it is. I could make more in numerous fields than nursing. The instructors have always thrown the money issue in the face of the male students. I really feel that most people who hold this view should really examine their feelings and ask if they are being true to themselves in saying this out loud.