Is there REALLY a nursing shortage?

suzanne4, RN · May 14, 2004

A green card holder must be paid the same wages as all of the others. They cannot differentiate pay because the green card is permanent citizenship, not a temporary work permit.

The US was bringing in large numbers of nurses twenty years ago from the Philippines. Did it ever keep any of us from having work? If the nurse is educated with a BS degree, I highly suspect that her family/spouse will have the same educational level. And where did your grandparents come from?

Most of use have grandparents, at least, that were immigrants..................

suzanne4, RN · May 14, 2004

So, if you are an American, and happen to fall in love with someone from another country, they shouldn't be allowed to come to the US because they may take a job from you?

:uhoh3: :angryfire

Hellllllo Nurse, BSN, RN · May 14, 2004

No, there isn't. Dept of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics stats bear this out:

The current number of unfilled nursing jobs supposedly r/t the shortage is approx. 400,000.

the current number of licensed RNs in the U.S. currently working in non-nursing occupations is approx. 500,000.

You do the math- there is actually a surplus of 100,000 RNs in The U.S. right now.

The Powers That Be which perpetuate the myth of the nursing shortage love it when nurses object to the importation of foreign nurses. This is because the race card will be pulled, and anyone who objects to importation of foreign nurses appears to be a racist. This creates a smoke-screen, thus diverting attention from the real problem: Nurses leave the bedside because of poor working conditions, lack of respect and working environments which discourage quality pt care by their very nature. Rather than address these problems and lure nurses back to the bedside, gov't and big business prefer to import foreign nurses and crank out the new grads.

Many Americans object to outsourcing of American jobs. This is not done because there are no workers in The U.S. to fill these jobs- it's done because of corporate greed. Importing foreign nurses is no different.

Almost 500,000 licensed registered nurses were not employed as nurses in 2000.*

Data from the Health Resources and Services Administration's (HRSA's) 2000 national sample survey of RNs shows that more than 500,000 licensed nurses (more than 18% of the national nurse workforce) have chosen not to work in nursing. This available labor pool could be drawn back into nursing if they found the employment opportunities attractive enough**

The ANA maintains that the deterioration in the working conditions for nurses is the primary cause for the staff vacancies being reported by hospitals and nursing facilities - not a systemic nursing shortage. Nurses are opting not to take these nursing jobs because they are not attracted to positions where they will be confronted by mandatory overtime and short staffing. **

76.6% (of) Licensed RNs (in The U.S. are) Employed in Nursing***

* Projected Supply, Demand and Shortages of Registered Nurses: 2000-2020 (released on 7/30/03 by the National Center for Health Workforce Analysis, Bureau of Health Professions, Health Resources and Services Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services). The Bureau of Labor Statistics, in an earlier report, predicted that that we will need one million new nurses by 2010 (Monthly Labor Review - November 2001) to cover new positions and replace the nurses who have retired.

**http://www.nursingworld.org/gova/fe.../107/ovrtme.htm

***https://www.aacn.org/aacn/practice....a6?OpenDocument

__________________

Hellllllo Nurse, BSN, RN · May 14, 2004

A green card holder must be paid the same wages as all of the others. QUOTE]
The above is completely false.

Torachan · May 14, 2004

Marie030473 - Sorry if I sounded to harsh.

I have worked in 3 countries (whilst on a working holiday) and put up with the "you are taking our jobs" that not one national applied for a position there and that the wages and conditions were exploitive still did not take the sting out of the comments.

I don't believe that there is a shortage. That is, in my opinion, a ruse to get nurses to work under intolerable conditions (we can't recruit anyone you'll just have to bust your hump). Bringing in Nurses from OS is exploitive. In fact 3rd world nations have apparently begged first world nations to stop poaching their nurses.

The myth has attracted many students to study nursing. Asked why many of my cohort state stable employment and plenty of jobs as the reason. The fact is that there aren't plenty of jobs. Queensland Health were inundated with calls from graduates asking where all the jobs were, and wasn't there a nursing shortage. The official reply was that QLD health never said there was a shortage. WHo has been saying that?

I say the answer may be that everyone goes agency or at least union.

ShimmaShimma0304 · May 14, 2004

Marie030473 - Sorry if I sounded to harsh.
I have worked in 3 countries (whilst on a working holiday) and put up with the "you are taking our jobs" that not one national applied for a position there and that the wages and conditions were exploitive still did not take the sting out of the comments.
I don't believe that there is a shortage. That is, in my opinion, a ruse to get nurses to work under intolerable conditions (we can't recruit anyone you'll just have to bust your hump). Bringing in Nurses from OS is exploitive. In fact 3rd world nations have apparently begged first world nations to stop poaching their nurses.
The myth has attracted many students to study nursing. Asked why many of my cohort state stable employment and plenty of jobs as the reason. The fact is that there aren't plenty of jobs. Queensland Health were inundated with calls from graduates asking where all the jobs were, and wasn't there a nursing shortage. The official reply was that QLD health never said there was a shortage. WHo has been saying that?
I say the answer may be that everyone goes agency or at least union.

Torachan, I'd LOVE to work with you, an Aussie (or anywhere else, for that matter), because I love people and people from other countries fascinate me. I hope you understand what I was talking about in my original post. It's not about the people who come to work here... it's the intent behind it as the post from the "Helloooo" poster said (can't remember exact poster's name ) I think ALL people should try to better themselves and seek better opportunities... I object to the corporations that are trying to spew out to us that there is a nursing shortage (and justify bringing people into the U.S. for CHEAPER labor) when, in fact, as you said they are simply trying to have us "suck it up" and work short-handed, etc. So I completely agree/identify with your post. My fiance is a union electrician, although the union here in Louisiana is not very strong (stronger in California, Illinois and many other places). He keeps saying that a union is the answer. For now, I choose agency.

ShimmaShimma0304 · May 14, 2004

So, if you are an American, and happen to fall in love with someone from another country, they shouldn't be allowed to come to the US because they may take a job from you?
:angryfire

Good LORD!!! You are STILL missing the freakin' POINT!!!! (I am NOT talking to you anymore... it's like beating my head to a bloody pulp against a brick wall) :rolleyes:

ShimmaShimma0304 · May 14, 2004

Anyone who believes a hospital HAS to pay all nurses the same thing is not "up" on anything.
Any business can change their pay grades tomorrow and exempt current employees. Say, the new grad LPN is making 21.00/hr. Hired today, she/he would make 21. Hired tomorrow, he/she could be making 15. There is nothing against the law there.
This doesn't affect JUST nursing either.... So, they help the nurse come over, pay her/him on the same payscale they've been using for years. This is OK... but what about his/her family? Newbies to the country rarely come alone. They bring the whole family. What about the jobs they will be taking? The regulations can only cover so much, then it fails. That's what we should be worried about. Not the few that come over under a specific program. It's the family that comes with or follows.
I would like to ask the original post 1 question. Why is it you think the Chinese Gov has no respect for human life?

Did I say that I thought all nurses should be paid the same? I don't recall that. Maybe I'm misunderstanding the first sentence of your post. ???

Okay... re: the Chinese gov't: Okay... Here's an excerpt from something RECENT as of April 2004...

Press Associates, Inc. (PAI) -- 4/5/2004

WITNESS: CHINESE WORKERS ROBBED OF WAGES, FORCED TO SUICIDE

By Mark Gruenberg

PAI Staff Writer

WASHINGTON (PAI)--Last October 1 in Beijing, on China'a National Day, Yang Pei Quan poured gasoline on himself in Tienanmen Square and lit a match.

The construction worker from Hubei was broke--because his employer refused to pay him anything at all for months, and he could not return to his rural village in disgrace.

Yang was one of many workers forced to protest their lack of pay last year by committing suicide, a Chinese workers' rights leader said after a Senate Democratic Policy Committee hearing March 29 on China's labor conditions. His self-immolation just happened to be the most publicized case.

"There are hundreds of such cases. They jump off bridges and more often pour gasoline on themselves as a way of protesting," Ciping Huang, Secretary-General of the Overseas Chinese Democracy Coalition, told Press Associates.

And Yang isn't alone, she added: Chinese government policy and police backing of employers produce abominable working conditions in the People's Republic--such as no pay at all.

"The employers worked them and didn't pay them. And when they (workers) protested, the employers were backed up by the government," she explained.

Government and employer practices like that prompted the AFL-CIO on March 16 to file the first-ever labor-conditions trade case under U.S. trade law, against China.

In a wide-ranging, well-documented complaint, the federation showed China not only breaks World Trade Organization rules--which it agreed to several years ago--but its own laws, including its wage laws.

And that Chinese law-breaking in turn costs U.S. workers at least 727,000 jobs, the federation's complaint added.

The complaint, under Section 301 of U.S. trade law, lets the U.S. formally challenge such inhuman working conditions as violations of the WTO trade treaty China signed--if Bush regime officials choose to do so. They have until the end of April to decide whether to probe and protest.

The federation's action, in turn, led Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) and Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) to chair the hearing, to put pressure on Bush to probe the Chinese practices.

"The workers of China are grossly underpaid and lack basic protections, such as pensions and health insurance," Ciping Huang testified. "China's export workers earn pitifully low wages--as little as 15 cents to 30 cents an hour--and receive brutal treatment.

"Some had to work up to 12-16 hours a day, 7 days a week" and days off are nonexistent for months and years, Huang said. "And when workers reach their prime age of 40 or 50, they are laid off" without safety nets. For women, the layoff age may be 30, she pointed out.

"There is no competitive labor market, let alone rights of unionization, to ensure that workers' earnings grow with their productivity" or to protect them, she said.

U.S.-based multinationals use those conditions to increase their use of Chinese labor, and their profits, added Columbia Law School Professor Mark Barenberg, who drafted the AFL-CIO's case.

"I was distressed by what I saw during my research in China" for two years, he explained. Barenberg, who is also an economist, met factory managers who were hired by U.S. firms.

They told him, on condition of anonymity, of hazardous working conditions, workers' rights abuses and exposure of workers to toxic chemicals.

The abuses include Chinese government work permits that limit job mobility, mandates that workers pay up to a year's salary in advance to get a permit and "dormitories" where workers, usually young women, are locked in after work hours.

"They become bonded laborers, a form of forced labor under international law," and illegal, he added. Elaborating on Cipuang Huang's comments, Barenberg "talked to workers who were not paid for six months or a year at a stretch, and when they were (his emphasis) paid, they got half of what they were promised. That's routine in China.

(**** This is the end of the excerpt****) Now... we can all go buy something at Wal-mart or Bed, Bath and Beyond or many other billions of places that has a little stamp/sticker on it saying "Made in China." LOOK AT HOW MUCH THESE PEOPLE GET PAID-- IF THEY EVEN GET PAID AT ALL-- WHY DO YOU THINK THINGS ARE SO CHEAP AT WAL-MART, ETC??? IT'S BECAUSE THEY ARE MADE OS BY PEOPLE MAYBE PAID A FEW CENTS/HR. OF COURSE IT WILL BE CHEAP FOR US HERE TO BUY IT.

My heart goes out to the poor people in China. Would anything at ALL like this be allowed in the U.S. or any other country that is NOT communist and obsessed with ruling the whole damned world??? The Chinese gov't has NO regard for human life OR it's people. It's all about money, money, money. Yes, there are corporations/people like this in the U.S. but we are a FREE country and I happen to be proud of that. I wish China were free. It's very, very sad. :stone

suzanne4, RN · May 14, 2004

A green card holder must be paid the same wages as all of the others. QUOTE]
The above is completely false.
You are wrong. Temporary workers can be paid at a different scale and usually are. Green card holders are permanent residents and have to be paid at the same rate. Sure, if the nurse is contracted thru an agency, then the agency may be taking a bigger bite from what the hospital is paying. I deal with this on a daily basis. Perhaps you need to look at the regulations from the US Government. :angryfire
Sure rates can vary by what is paid, but if two nurses with the same degree, the same years experience, etc. both get accepted for a job the same day on the same unit, the hospital cannot offer one nurse $25/hr because she is an American and the other $15/hr because she is a green card holder. It is illegal to do this. This is what I am talking about when referring to the same salary.

Dixiedi · May 14, 2004

Did I say that I thought all nurses should be paid the same? I don't recall that. Maybe I'm misunderstanding the first sentence of your post. ???
Okay... re: the Chinese gov't: Okay... Here's an excerpt from something RECENT as of April 2004...
Press Associates, Inc. (PAI) -- 4/5/2004
WITNESS: CHINESE WORKERS ROBBED OF WAGES, FORCED TO SUICIDE
By Mark Gruenberg
PAI Staff Writer
WASHINGTON (PAI)--Last October 1 in Beijing, on China'a National Day, Yang Pei Quan poured gasoline on himself in Tienanmen Square and lit a match.
The construction worker from Hubei was broke--because his employer refused to pay him anything at all for months, and he could not return to his rural village in disgrace.
Yang was one of many workers forced to protest their lack of pay last year by committing suicide, a Chinese workers' rights leader said after a Senate Democratic Policy Committee hearing March 29 on China's labor conditions. His self-immolation just happened to be the most publicized case.
"There are hundreds of such cases. They jump off bridges and more often pour gasoline on themselves as a way of protesting," Ciping Huang, Secretary-General of the Overseas Chinese Democracy Coalition, told Press Associates.
And Yang isn't alone, she added: Chinese government policy and police backing of employers produce abominable working conditions in the People's Republic--such as no pay at all.
"The employers worked them and didn't pay them. And when they (workers) protested, the employers were backed up by the government," she explained.
Government and employer practices like that prompted the AFL-CIO on March 16 to file the first-ever labor-conditions trade case under U.S. trade law, against China.
In a wide-ranging, well-documented complaint, the federation showed China not only breaks World Trade Organization rules--which it agreed to several years ago--but its own laws, including its wage laws.
And that Chinese law-breaking in turn costs U.S. workers at least 727,000 jobs, the federation's complaint added.
The complaint, under Section 301 of U.S. trade law, lets the U.S. formally challenge such inhuman working conditions as violations of the WTO trade treaty China signed--if Bush regime officials choose to do so. They have until the end of April to decide whether to probe and protest.
The federation's action, in turn, led Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) and Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) to chair the hearing, to put pressure on Bush to probe the Chinese practices.
"The workers of China are grossly underpaid and lack basic protections, such as pensions and health insurance," Ciping Huang testified. "China's export workers earn pitifully low wages--as little as 15 cents to 30 cents an hour--and receive brutal treatment.
"Some had to work up to 12-16 hours a day, 7 days a week" and days off are nonexistent for months and years, Huang said. "And when workers reach their prime age of 40 or 50, they are laid off" without safety nets. For women, the layoff age may be 30, she pointed out.
"There is no competitive labor market, let alone rights of unionization, to ensure that workers' earnings grow with their productivity" or to protect them, she said.
U.S.-based multinationals use those conditions to increase their use of Chinese labor, and their profits, added Columbia Law School Professor Mark Barenberg, who drafted the AFL-CIO's case.
"I was distressed by what I saw during my research in China" for two years, he explained. Barenberg, who is also an economist, met factory managers who were hired by U.S. firms.
They told him, on condition of anonymity, of hazardous working conditions, workers' rights abuses and exposure of workers to toxic chemicals.
The abuses include Chinese government work permits that limit job mobility, mandates that workers pay up to a year's salary in advance to get a permit and "dormitories" where workers, usually young women, are locked in after work hours.
"They become bonded laborers, a form of forced labor under international law," and illegal, he added. Elaborating on Cipuang Huang's comments, Barenberg "talked to workers who were not paid for six months or a year at a stretch, and when they were (his emphasis) paid, they got half of what they were promised. That's routine in China.
(**** This is the end of the excerpt****) Now... we can all go buy something at Wal-mart or Bed, Bath and Beyond or many other billions of places that has a little stamp/sticker on it saying "Made in China." LOOK AT HOW MUCH THESE PEOPLE GET PAID-- IF THEY EVEN GET PAID AT ALL-- WHY DO YOU THINK THINGS ARE SO CHEAP AT WAL-MART, ETC??? IT'S BECAUSE THEY ARE MADE OS BY PEOPLE MAYBE PAID A FEW CENTS/HR. OF COURSE IT WILL BE CHEAP FOR US HERE TO BUY IT.
My heart goes out to the poor people in China. Would anything at ALL like this be allowed in the U.S. or any other country that is NOT communist and obsessed with ruling the whole damned world??? The Chinese gov't has NO regard for human life OR it's people. It's all about money, money, money. Yes, there are corporations/people like this in the U.S. but we are a FREE country and I happen to be proud of that. I wish China were free. It's very, very sad. :stone

That first part of my laast reply was in reference to the nurse who stated hospitals must pay all nurses on the same scale. She's wrong. There are many ways around that. I agree 100% with you.

The other, about Chinese working conditions...I have to admit, I didn't know they were anywhere near that bad. But at the same time, I am not at all suprised. However, we can not allow all the Chinese who are having problems at work come over here. We have to start looking out for us!

In response to the nurse who stated where did you grandparents come from? Mine came off the reservation. What about yours? That really is beside the point too. Before the country bacame so crowded we could allow anyone with the where-with-all to get here come on in and make it home. However, we can't continue to do that. As a country we must severely restrict imigration. More and more of our fewer and fewer jobs are being given to non-Americans. This is a huge problem.

In reponse to the one who believes we are 100,000 RNs over the need...not really. Most of them are University educated nurses who willingly leave because the job is not what the thought it was going to be. nights, weekends, blood, guts, vomit, stool, urine, bile and every other thing they didn't get up close and personal with in shcool. Let's get back to hospital education as a required first step for all nurses and the shortage will be a thing of the past, finally. I've been a nurse for over 30 years, there has always been a shortage of one kind or another.

Well, off to work again for me.... we could use a few nurses too. I had a 0800 - 1000 to get a kid up and ready for school this am and have 2 venti kids 1130 - 2330 in a foster home with 4 special needs kids. There's plenty of work, and it pays well if you don't mind getting your hands dirty, a little sweaty and frequently cursed at by kids with TBI. (I'm just thankful they can talk!)

nightingale, RN · May 14, 2004

moderator reminder

let's not turn this interesting discussion into something it is not; let's not have personal references. we are to discuss the issues not someones (or what someone) thinks is a personal reference.

we are very fortunate to have such a diverse, intelligent, and passionate group discuss this topic. let's use our posting privileges wisely.

night

nod · May 15, 2004

When you get what you want in your struggle for self, and the world lets you have your own way, it is true, just go to the mirror and look at yourself, and see what that person will say.