According to a new US Cenus report, male nurses make more money and have more than tripled since 1970. Women still dominate nursing in terms of employment but not in terms of earnings. The average female nurse earned $51,100 in 2011, 16% less than the $60,700 earned by the average man in the same job.
The nursing profession remains overwhelmingly female, but the representation of men has increased as the demand for nurses has grown over the last several decades, according to a you.S. Census Bureau study released today.
The new study shows the proportion of male registered nurses has more than tripled since 1970, from 2.7 percent to 9.6 percent, and the proportion of male licensed practical and licensed vocational nurses has more than doubled from 3.9 percent to 8.1 percent.1
The study, Men in Nursing Occupations, presents data from the 2011 American Community Survey to analyze the percentage of men in each of the detailed nursing occupations: registered nurse, nurse anesthetist, nurse practitioner, and licensed practical and licensed vocational nurse. The study, and accompanying detailed tables, also provide estimates on a wide range of characteristics of men and women in nursing occupations. These include employment status, age, race, Hispanic origin, citizenship, educational attainment, work hours, time of departure to work, median earnings, industry and class of worker.
"The aging of our population has fueled an increasing demand for long-term care and end-of-life services," said the report's author, Liana Christin Landivar, a sociologist in the Census Bureau's Industry and Occupation Statistics Branch. "A predicted shortage has led to recruiting and retraining efforts to increase the pool of nurses. These efforts have included recruiting men into nursing."
Men typically outearn women in nursing fields but not by as much as they do across all occupations. For example, women working as nurses full time, year-round earned 91 cents for every dollar male nurses earned; in contrast, women earned 77 cents to the dollar men earned across all occupations.
Because the demand for skilled nursing care is so high, nurses have very low unemployment rates. Unemployment was lowest among nurse practitioners and nurse anesthetists (about 0.8 percent for both). For registered nurses and licensed practical and licensed vocational nurses, these rates were a bit higher, but still very low, at 1.8 percent and 4.3 percent, respectively.
Other highlights:
There were 3.5 million employed nurses in 2011, about 3.2 million of whom were female and 330,000 male.
Of the employed nurses (both sexes), 78 percent were registered nurses, 19 percent were licensed practical and licensed vocational nurses, 3 percent were nurse practitioners, and 1 percent were nurse anesthetists.
While most registered nurses (both sexes) left home for work between 5 a.m. and 11:59 a.m. (72 percent), a sizable minority (19 percent) worked the evening or night shifts.
The majority of registered nurses (both sexes) worked in hospitals (64 percent). The majority of licensed practical and licensed vocational nurses worked in nursing care facilities or hospitals (about 30 percent each). The percentages for hospitals and nursing care facilities are not significantly different from each other.
In 2011, 9 percent of all nurses were men while 91 percent were women. Men earned, on average, $60,700 per year, while women earned $51,100 per year.
Men's representation was highest among nurse anesthetists at 41 percent.
Male nurse anesthetists earned more than twice as much as the male average for all nursing occupations: $162,900 versus $60,700.
The American Community Survey provides a wide range of important statistics about people and housing for every community across the nation. The results are used by everyone from town and city planners to retailers and homebuilders. The survey is the only source of local estimates for most of the 40 topics it covers, such as education, occupation, language, ancestry and housing costs for even the smallest communities. Ever since Thomas Jefferson directed the first census in 1790, the census has collected detailed characteristics about our nation's people. Questions about jobs and the economy were added 20 years later under James Madison, who said such information would allow Congress to "adapt the public measures to the particular circumstances of the community," and over the decades allow America "an opportunity of marking the progress of the society."
1The difference between the 2011 estimate and the 2000 and 2006 estimates for the percentage of licensed practical and licensed vocational nurses who are men is not statistically significant.
I was using an example. If you compared the salaries of a single man who has full custody of his child to a single woman who has full custody of her child, I bet the salary Is the same as well. The people who make these observations that men make more than women do not take into account that women have childcare responsibilities. If the studies were adjusted to reflect that difference, do you really think that there would be as big a disparity??
Keep in mind, also--they are not checking how much money a person is making an hour, they are asking the average yearly salary. If you compare that, there probably WILL be a difference. This study does not take into account shift differentials, bonuses, charge nurse pay, etc. It only takes the annual pay. It seems kind of silly to do that when we all know there will be a difference between the night shift and the day shift salaries. plus weekend diff. If a male nurse makes more than me and we have the same experience, educational background, and rate of pay, it is likely to be because he is working more hours, or because he is getting a shift differential that I am not getting and that would be due to my PERSONAL choices, not because he is a man.
Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.
DebblesRN said:
I also egree with a previous poster that regional salaries need to be taken into consideration because rates of pay throughout the country increase and decrease due to cost of living.
*** Really? You believe that nurses are paid more or less in different parts of the country cause the cost of living in higher or lower in those areas?
Yep.........i make less than some of the men i work with because i don't want to work 72 hours a pp...............no thank you. i will stick to less hours........
*** Really? You believe that nurses are paid more or less in different parts of the country cause the cost of living in higher or lower in those areas?
I'm not a feminist-activist type, but from what I've seen there is definitely a glass escalator for men in nursing, no doubt about it. Personally, during a student internship, I (along with most of the other females) was placed on one of the general floors (still a very busy floor & a great learning experience) while nearly everyone placed in the ICUs was male. I came to learn that many of them didn't have the grades or experience I did, however they were fast tracked into the ICU. Since the ICU often enables a faster track into CRNA and NP schools, it stands to reason men will earn more. This is just my personal experience and I'm not bitter about it, however my nursing school friends and I have noted that men always make it to the better paying positions a little faster than the rest of us. However, nearly every single male RN I've met is hardworking, smart, and dedicated, so their success is well deserved. It would be nice to see a little more equality overall for us girls though.
I'm doing an ADN TO BSN program right now. One of my professors wrote an article on how therapeutic massage lessons pain levels in the ER. Haha! Who has time to massage somebody in the ER! Are you kidding me. She just wanted to put that ole doctorate on paper and flash it around. Jeeeze. What a important article, NOT
Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.
DebblesRN said:
ummmm, that's a common fact, but evidently you didn't understand my sentence, or took it out of context.
I'm choosing to believe that, because otherwise, I am thinking you and another poster are basically saying I'm an idiot, and that's not cool.
*** Falling victim to false propaganda from what SHOULD be a reliable source doesn't make anyone an idiot. I would never suggest ANYONE is an idiot based on a 2 or 3 message interaction. I was not saying you are an idiot and if I came across that way I apologise.
Specializes in burn ICU, SICU, ER, Trauma Rapid Response.
Maria L, BSN said:
I'm not a feminist-activist type, but from what I've seen there is definitely a glass escalator for men in nursing, no doubt about it. Personally, during a student internship, I (along with most of the other females) was placed on one of the general floors (still a very busy floor & a great learning experience) while nearly everyone placed in the ICUs was male. I came to learn that many of them didn't have the grades or experience I did, however they were fast tracked into the ICU. Since the ICU often enables a faster track into CRNA and NP schools, it stands to reason men will earn more. This is just my personal experience and I'm not bitter about it, however my nursing school friends and I have noted that men always make it to the better paying positions a little faster than the rest of us. However, nearly every single male RN I've met is hardworking, smart, and dedicated, so their success is well deserved. It would be nice to see a little more equality overall for us girls though.
*** I agree with you. I was the only male in my nursing school. When we went to clinicals there was one available spot for a student in ICU (small hospital) and I was given it. I know that several others had asked for it. I did have the grades and had a lot of experience as an army medic, paramedic, and LPN so that may be why I got the ICU slot but it didn't appear that way to the female students. There was a moderate amount of complaining and a small amount of true bitterness demonstrated.
That ICU clinical played a roll in my getting into a 9 month Critical Care Nurse Residency program as a new grad. That job got me several very lucrative travel positions, and later a really fun job on a mobil intensive care ambulance (ground and air). That job got me the very high paying and fun full time Rapid Response gig I have now.
Must be cause of my sex. That is a little disapointing as I though I had gotten here on my merits.
One place I have found where female nurses make more money is when they are entrepreneurs. Women have more skills when it comes to relationship building, so have an advantage when they want to try a different path in using their nursing skills. Women on my team are more coachable too!
DebblesRN, ASN, BSN, RN
151 Posts
I was using an example. If you compared the salaries of a single man who has full custody of his child to a single woman who has full custody of her child, I bet the salary Is the same as well. The people who make these observations that men make more than women do not take into account that women have childcare responsibilities. If the studies were adjusted to reflect that difference, do you really think that there would be as big a disparity??
Keep in mind, also--they are not checking how much money a person is making an hour, they are asking the average yearly salary. If you compare that, there probably WILL be a difference. This study does not take into account shift differentials, bonuses, charge nurse pay, etc. It only takes the annual pay. It seems kind of silly to do that when we all know there will be a difference between the night shift and the day shift salaries. plus weekend diff. If a male nurse makes more than me and we have the same experience, educational background, and rate of pay, it is likely to be because he is working more hours, or because he is getting a shift differential that I am not getting and that would be due to my PERSONAL choices, not because he is a man.