Nursing Shortage

[Nutmeg5575]

A friend showed this to me. This is from the Bureau of Health Professions. I imagine most of you have seen this already, and if I am repeating what someone else has posted I'm sorry. It shows the projected shortage/excess of nurses for each state for the years 2000-2020. It starts on page 13. On page 14 it shows it by state and it shows the projected prgress eah page after that. Maryland (the state i live in) goes from a shortage of -545 to -18,954 by 2020. What do you think of these statistics? What do you think needs to be done to help with this shortage but at the same time does not sacrifice the quality of professionals hired? What is the real problem? It seems like no one wants to be a nurse. When I tell my friends I am in nursing school they say that's awesome but they couldn't do it.

ftp://ftp.hrsa.gov/bhpr/nationalcenter/rnproject.pdf

[JeanettePNP, MSN, RN, NP]

That's funny. It seems like everyone wants to be a nurse and for every opening in nursing school there are 400 applicants who are turned away.

[Demonsthenes]

According to communist theory, capitalistic systems tend to be most repressive to those professions which, if the free market were allowed to work it's course, would command the greatest pay, the best job security, and the best job benefits.

The same addresses the short term need for reducing the labor costs of skilled labor (through political-economic oppression) but in the long term it destroys the skilled labor force in question.

Thus, in the USA and in many Western Capitalistic countries, the response of governments and employeers to the increasing nursing shortage has not been to address the causes of the same but to maintain, through draconian political and economic means, the low wages, the lack of job security, and poor working conditions endemic in nursing by the imporation of massive numbers of foreign nurses and legislation that is oppressive to nursing and nurses.

Of course high tech and other professions have met the same fate as nurses to what communists refer to as "monopoly capitalism".

If capitalism, our free market system, our personal freedoms, and nursing are to survive these inequities must be efficaciously addressed by our government(s).

To be a good capitalist you must understand the failings of capitalism by studying Marxist criticism of the same.

I am a moderate libertarian but fit no particualar political mode taking what I consider the best from a variety of political theories and practices.

I am an R.N. and Certified Legal Assistant.:chuckle

[Roy Fokker, BSN, RN]

To be a good capitalist you must understand the failings of capitalism by studying Marxist criticism of the same.

Of the trouble I have with Communism (of which I have many), one of the biggest economic complaints I have is Marx's Theory of Value.

How in the world can value be an absolute and not a relative, is beyond me.

I agree that capitalism isn't the best system - but it's far better than the others. Capitalism affords the greatest amount of choice.