Nursing shortage no more?

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I graduate nursing school in August of this year and now I am worried. I have several friends that have already graduated nursing school and many of them are having a hard time finding a job. I already work at a level 1 trauma center in Va but there is only one floor hiring that will even consider new grads. Is this something that is happening all over the country or is there still a nursing shortage? Where are the states that are still hiring?

Getting back to the VA Hospitals... I had been applying to the one here in Tampa as a student LPN for the length of my entire program. I was told face to face by one of the recruiters:

"We may not hire students right now. We just don't have the money like we used to. For example, we have over 20 RN positions open and ready to fill but last month we could only hire 4 nurses because that's all we can afford at this time."

That was in January 2009 while the economy was falling hard. Though I'm a new LPN (just graduated in December), I applied to an open MA position (found on craigslist.com) at a large, reputable cardiology clinic (my dream field!!!). I got the job within 48hours as an MA supervisor with full benefits AND they are paying for my ACLS :D.

My advice... don't just stick with hospitals... they certainly are not the only ones with benefits.

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There has never been a nursing shortage-just a shortage of nurses that work as nurses. Check out how many nurses are licensed, then compare these figures to how many are still working as nurses...

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I'm from Texas (DFW area), graduate May 2010 and still havn't found a job.

awsmfun--i havn't looked at the statistics but that sounds to be likely!

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