i just heard a comment from someone, who said that once i am a nurse that i will not be getting what i expect. they said that the usa, in general, is paying nurses to come over here, and work for less...therefore driving down the hourly pay for nurses and taking more jobs, that could have been given to us people from here. now, i don't want to make this a debate, i'm just curious if this is true.
i wouldn't exactly call it outsourcing..but what is it? if so, this is very discouraging. my fiance works in labor and it seems like everything is being driven down to pennies by the "outsiders"...but hey, i blame the greedy people who hire them. they aren't doing it for any other reason except for lower wages/labor. can someone give me a little input on this?
i live in nyc and i have to say, the last time i was in the hospital i was very surprised that none of the nurses and assistants spoke english very well at all...it was painfully obvious that they weren't from here...again, not discriminating..but i wonder...are usa citizens sort of discriminated against since we want better wages? is this why people say that medical assistants are replacing lpns etc?
over here in nyc a registered nurse can expect to start off making $36-40/hr. (honestly, for the stress nurses go thru i think it should be way more). this is fairly decent and may seem like a lot to others..but keep in mind that we pay $1,400 for a tiny studio in a decent area of queens (not even in the city). so our $36-40/hr translates to about $20ish/hr somewhere like down south or the midwest. definitely a liveable wage..but i think for the intensity of the job it should be more. ok, enough blabbing..i just need some feedback and views on this. thanks :)
While a unique perspective Shodobe, what do we do where there are NO foreign-trained nurses? The foreign-trained nurses are few and far between in more rural areas. So, while your solution might solve the problem in Ca (and I sincerely doubt that it would), it would not work in the rest of the US.
While you are in a unique position that there none in your area, here in Calif it seems there are more than we should have. I think what I am getting at is the ones that are here are not well versed in American ways and seem to struggle too much. I would feel better if there were more stingent exams especially in the English parts. Too many foreign nurses do not know English as they lead you to believe. I get really tired and frustrated trying to get answers out of nurses who really aren't prepared for working in the US system. OK, I will take back we should revoke their visas but I still stand on the belief that a better knowledge and speaking of the English language would help the situation tremendously. I work with some very good foreign nurses but there many I would just rather they weren't working.
Specializes in ACNP-BC, Adult Critical Care, Cardiology.
Before we all get side-tracked and start talking about the horrible English language skills of some foreign nurses we know who were allowed to work in the US, let's get back to the OP's question which asks if foreign nurses are replacing US born nurses in this country. I think the question has already been answered. The government has not lifted retrogression which basically put an end to the steady influx of employment-based sponsorship for foreign nurses by US healthcare facilities. If you still work with many foreign nurses, majority were hired before retrogression which took effect in 2006. And speaking of Filipino nurses, many do tend to settle in major US cities in warmer regions like TraumaRUs stated.
I think you are missing the point, there are very limited visas therefore is not an influx of nurses. The Philippines the largest exporter of nurses reports that only average 237 to the US a year. I know a majority come to California but it seems that your hospital is taking them all.
It still seems the majority of new hires are from foreign born and trained nurses. I work with quite a few from the Phillipines and most are very competent. It is disheartening when you hear them talk about only going to school in the Phillipines to come to the US to work. Far better pay and benes. I still feel they are taking away the majority of jobs available to new grads. Unless they have a permanent resident card for work, their green card should only be temp. This might sound a bit sour on my part but when it comes to new hires ALL US trained grads should be given a preference over foreign born and trained nurses dispite their experience.
To answer the above OP, I am not outdated I just seem to see what is happening. Maybe it is only in certain states, but Calif seems to still have quite a number of foreign nurses.
There are great numbers of Philipinos in Chicago too. Thorek Hospital was nearly all Philipino nurses at one point. I had to throw a temper tantrum one night to get people to speak English as I just could not stand it anymore. It was like a foreign country.
Now I am a immigrant in a foreign country and know firsthandedly what it feels like to be exploited by a system that would rather maintain the status quo than to improve pay or conditions. This is enabled through making it easy for employers to exploit the immigrants.
It is all rather hypocritical though when most nurses here are probably supporting the expolitation of immigrants in some way. That illegal cleaning lady or childcare worker. Buying food from farmers who exploite immigrants. Where is the cut off? One step below your job at the LTC facility?
It's true that there's been a halt to "importing" foreign nurses to the US, so the complaint you're hearing is a little out of date.
Just to clarify, though, the complaint that foreign nurses bring wages down is not that they are paid less than their native-trained counterparts. The problem is when facilities look to foreign nurses to fill their positions instead of increasing the pay and/or improving the working conditions in order to recruit and retain local nurses.
I can see, though, that to provide the wages and working conditions (low nurse to patient ratios) needed to attract and keep local nurses could mean that a facility can't stay profitable or that individuals and insurances can't or won't afford the higher costs.
This is such a sad situation that I believe will get worse as the financial crunch gets worse.
I can only hope things will be dealt with professionally, and that foreign RNs will not be discrimated against because they have come here legally but will now be accused of taking jobs which belong to Americans.
I am a green card holder and came to live here in 2005, I have worked hard have a great job, I spend a lot of my job educating and developing new grads and student nurses from the USA. I am frequently scheduled as charge, I am popular as a member of staff, I am treated well.
I have made my place at work-I dont believe I have stolen a job, there were hundreds of jobs around when I got my job-I worked side by side with other RN's always being shortstaffed never complaining. So is it right that I should be considered a thief now things are tight. I paid my dues
I have come to realise that most of the people who complain about foreign born workers have a personall problem with immigrants. America is not an Island and cannot exist on it's own. If all foreign born workers were eliminated, it would be the first country in the world to do so. All countries in Europe hire foreign born workers. In fact in UK, international students are allowed to work unlike in the US. If the US keeps pushing others out, it will never have good relations with other countries.
Wake up Folks!! This is the 21st century and we are in a global economy. We need to accept what we cannot change and move on. By the year 2030, caucasians willl be the minority in the US. I went for a conference and I heard something that was very austounding. By the time people in their 40s retire, minorities and immigrants will be paying their social security.
If you haven't stepped out beyond the US borders, you may not realise that we have Americans working in other countries all over the world---yet those countries have very high unemployment rates. Most hospitals like to hire immigrants coz they have very high work ethics and are very hard working. They don't call in for minor reasons. They are also very respectful especially with seniors since they have been taught to respect their elders. I think having them here may be good since they can teach us a thing or two about work ethics, respect and appreciating our differences.
Virginia Mason recently sent out a notice to staff nurses stating they were recruiting nurses from the Philipenes to replace travel/agency nurses. These new nurses, it is expected, will stay with the company and staffing will be better all around.
It wont work though. VM's problem is parking. It is a very well run hospital. I am a traveler looking to go staff and would work there, but I have reservations about being able to get to work on M-F day shifts. Its a nightmare for the staff people.
I see it this way. They have a very high amt. of travel nurses there. They can only get to a certain level of staff. Why? Because you cant park and get to work on weekdays. So, if the hospital parking can accomodate "X" number of workers............thats how many nurses they will have, regardless of whatever other changes they make. The fill up their floors with "X" number of staff nurses they have, then..........the rest of the spots are travelers who are housed in downtown Seattle and just walk to work.
Bringing in foreign nurses wont solve this. It may be worse for them. They are unfamiliar with the area, wont be able to find their way there as well at first. Building a satellite parking area instead of sending recruiters overseas would have solved all their problems.
Specializes in Medical and general practice now LTC.
Virginia Mason recently sent out a notice to staff nurses stating they were recruiting nurses from the Philipenes to replace travel/agency nurses. These new nurses, it is expected, will stay with the company and staffing will be better all around.
It wont work though. VM's problem is parking. It is a very well run hospital. I am a traveler looking to go staff and would work there, but I have reservations about being able to get to work on M-F day shifts. Its a nightmare for the staff people.
I see it this way. They have a very high amt. of travel nurses there. They can only get to a certain level of staff. Why? Because you cant park and get to work on weekdays. So, if the hospital parking can accomodate "X" number of workers............thats how many nurses they will have, regardless of whatever other changes they make. The fill up their floors with "X" number of staff nurses they have, then..........the rest of the spots are travelers who are housed in downtown Seattle and just walk to work.
Bringing in foreign nurses wont solve this. It may be worse for them. They are unfamiliar with the area, wont be able to find their way there as well at first. Building a satellite parking area instead of sending recruiters overseas would have solved all their problems.
Would love to know how they are going to bring new foreign nurses in from the Philippines, retrogression is affecting everyone and people filing now just join the longer queue already on the go. We are seeing members with a date of 2005 still waiting for a visa so the hospital getting them now just means they will be waiting several years so not helping the current situation
IDK. Maybe they've been working at it for a long time. I think the begining of 2010 is their targeted date to have this in place.
Or, it could be a message to the travelers (who got the email too for some reason, we are travelers, we dont care what you are doing in a year). A ploy to get us to go staff or something. lol.
Allegheny General in PA was famous for this stuff, trying to intimidate travelers to become staff.
Specializes in Medical and general practice now LTC.
Visas haven't moved for the last few months on those that are being processed so not sure how they can give a date of 2010, when they have no control over visas. Personally I think they are better looking at USC
shodobe
1,260 Posts
While you are in a unique position that there none in your area, here in Calif it seems there are more than we should have. I think what I am getting at is the ones that are here are not well versed in American ways and seem to struggle too much. I would feel better if there were more stingent exams especially in the English parts. Too many foreign nurses do not know English as they lead you to believe. I get really tired and frustrated trying to get answers out of nurses who really aren't prepared for working in the US system. OK, I will take back we should revoke their visas but I still stand on the belief that a better knowledge and speaking of the English language would help the situation tremendously. I work with some very good foreign nurses but there many I would just rather they weren't working.