I just got a raise....

gillbee1 · Apr 1, 2001

Originally posted by Zee_RN:
Like many other hospitals, my hospital is facing a nursing shortage and inadequate staffing. **Retention** is the big word right now. We have a "Retention & Recruitment" committee meeting regularly to address these concerns. So recently they made a big To-Do about making "market adjustment" salary adjustments...to accommodate the fact that you could leave your job here and go work at the hospital down the road for more money because of the shortage. Memos were sent out and posted. Unit Meetings were held. Big To-Do. Everyone was going "Wow, I can't believe they're doing this."

Well, I got my market adjustment. Five cents an hour. I work in ICU, have six years nursing experience...I went from $17.91 to $17.96 per hour. A lot of other people I talk to have gotten similar increases. Most I heard about was $0.37.

*Sigh* Does anybody else wonder? I mean, what's the point? Who did they satisfy with this? We went several years with no increases due to management screw-ups and then they do this. Wouldn't you think they'd have been better off to just LEAVE IT ALONE? Having made a big deal of it and then to hand out five cents?!

I never went into nursing for the money. But I find this whole raise-business here insulting. And we all know that money equates to respect...the more respect a position has, the more money it is given. And the lack of respect that nursing gets is really beginning to make me reconsider what I'm doing.

Thanks for letting me vent. *sigh*

Hey Zee, you are not alone. After many, many years of 35 to 50 cent raises, our hospital just handed out $1.50 raises to all nurses! I do think that nursing wages will finally get to a more palatable wage in the coming future with the nursing shortage. Of course when you are working like a dog, you deserve the extra money anyway! Hang in there!

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Mijourney · Apr 1, 2001

Hi Zee_RN. Congratulations on your, er uh, raise. What market are you referring to? The national market, state market, or local one? Naturally, the local market is the one that EMPLOYERS benefit the most from. However, even the national market pay for nurses do not address the dramatic increases we've experienced in the cost of living in the last two or three decades. Many nurses who are bread winners have a particularly difficult time taking care of even basic personal needs with the rate of pay received.

[This message has been edited by Mijourney (edited April 01, 2001).]

susanmary · Apr 2, 2001

Zee, don't spend the raise all in one place! Pretty pathetic. Have worked on recruitment and retention initiatives in my facility. I still don't understand why nurses aren't adequately compensated for retention. In Connecticut, there are HUGE pay incentives for nurses to work at facilities -- offering as much as $10,000 bonus to sign up for straight night shift (seriously.) Facilities can't get staff, can't keep staff, and offer insulting pay raises. My facility did not give retention raises, although many of the other area facilities gave generous retention raises in addition to annual raises this year. There doesn't seem to be a truly great pay difference between new nurses and experienced nurses -- why is this???????

PeggyOhio · Apr 2, 2001

You should take a copy of this article in to work. I'm going to. It's on the allnurses home page, from the Alberta news.

I wonder if any nurses up there in Calgary can confirm this news item.

Salary increase spurs return of ex-nurses

Refresher courses in big demand

Robert Walker

Calgary Herald; Southam Newspapers

Former nurses in Calgary are rushing to rejoin the profession following a recent provincial settlement of 22 per cent more money over two years.

Calgary Regional Health Authority has had 500 phone calls in the past two weeks asking about a refresher course to get back into the workforce as nurses, said Tyler Cleveland, director of human resources planning at the authority.

And 177 have signed up to take the distance-learning course run for the health authority by Grant MacEwan Community College in Edmonton.

Cleveland said the timing of the nurses' settlement likely helped the recruitment drive.

The contract agreed to this month means that by April next year, a nurse with nine years' experience will earn more than $64,000 a year, says the Provincial Health Authorities Association.

"Being the highest-paid nurses in Canada helps," said Joanne Stalinski, vice-president of human resources for Calgary Regional Health Authority. "I think that has to be a factor."

One former nurse, Wendy Isaacs of southeast Calgary, is excited at the prospect of going back to work.

She stopped teaching nursing at the former Calgary General Hospital in 1972 when she had her first baby.

"I thought I was too old," says Isaacs, 54.

Now she's signing up for the Grant MacEwan course.

"It's a great opportunity for me and the hospitals. They are getting experienced people with new skills," she said.

Some of the nurses coming back to work are among the 1,000 laid off in the mid-1990s when government cut 17 per cent from the health-care budget.

saskrn · Apr 3, 2001

PeggyOhio,

I'm from Saskatchewan, and working in the U.S. and from what my family tells me, that article is true.

oramar · Apr 3, 2001

Originally posted by PeggyOhio:
You should take a copy of this article in to work. I'm going to. It's on the allnurses home page, from the Alberta news.
I wonder if any nurses up there in Calgary can confirm this news item.

Salary increase spurs return of ex-nurses
Refresher courses in big demand

Robert Walker
Calgary Herald; Southam Newspapers

Former nurses in Calgary are rushing to rejoin the profession following a recent provincial settlement of 22 per cent more money over two years.

Calgary Regional Health Authority has had 500 phone calls in the past two weeks asking about a refresher course to get back into the workforce as nurses, said Tyler Cleveland, director of human resources planning at the authority.

And 177 have signed up to take the distance-learning course run for the health authority by Grant MacEwan Community College in Edmonton.

Cleveland said the timing of the nurses' settlement likely helped the recruitment drive.

The contract agreed to this month means that by April next year, a nurse with nine years' experience will earn more than $64,000 a year, says the Provincial Health Authorities Association.

"Being the highest-paid nurses in Canada helps," said Joanne Stalinski, vice-president of human resources for Calgary Regional Health Authority. "I think that has to be a factor."

One former nurse, Wendy Isaacs of southeast Calgary, is excited at the prospect of going back to work.

She stopped teaching nursing at the former Calgary General Hospital in 1972 when she had her first baby.

"I thought I was too old," says Isaacs, 54.

Now she's signing up for the Grant MacEwan course.

"It's a great opportunity for me and the hospitals. They are getting experienced people with new skills," she said.

Some of the nurses coming back to work are among the 1,000 laid off in the mid-1990s when government cut 17 per cent from the health-care budget.

I am glad someone posted this article, I read it and hoped someone would. MONEY DOES HELP, IT IS JUST THAT NOT TO MANY PEOPLE HAVE EVEN TRIED IT YET!!!!

Devon · Apr 3, 2001

i am in the 8th grade and i am doing a project on nurses i would like to know how much do nurses make????

minurse · Apr 4, 2001

Our hospital H.R. V.P. was recently quoted in the local paper that we "...got no bang for our buck" regarding sign on bonuses and that he hoped area hospital would quit offering them! The hospital has started offering a "referal bonus" to anyone (including the community at large) if a referal is made and an employee is hired! Our raises have been poor--thank goodness more than 5 cents.