Hi everybody,
I know there's been much discussion on the site re: the theoretical benefits/costs of Unionizing, but I was wondering if I might ask for some very practical advice re: dollars and cents: I'll be graduating this month (god-willing) and plan to take (and pass!) the NCLEX in early Sept (already had my application to NY BON months ago), but am doing research on Manhattan hospitals and am surprised to find what appear to be FAIRLY SIGNIFICANT difference in pay & benefits between Union v. Non-Union RN workforces. Could someone please confirm/deny what I seem to be finding:
1) About 30+ NYC area hosiptals have NYSNA RN-workforces where the RNs pay zero for medical premiums (but have only "HealthNet" MD choices + costlier out-of-network), pay zero for a defined-BENEFIT pension (which after 25+ years at ANY ONE OR MORE of the 30+ hospitals could easily reach $30K/year retirement), and pay zero for $50K life insurance.
2) Non-Union Manhattan Hospitals (Sloan-Kettering, Hospital for Special Surgery, NYU) pay similar salaries, but have NO pension, but DO have better health benefits, e.g., wider-selection of "in-network" primary care doctors).
3) NYC Hospitals (a separate Union than NYSNA?) have lower pay and sometimes difficult working conditions, but an even better pension after the recently-enacted contract (supposed to mirror police/fire ability to retire well after 20 years).
Unfortunately, my Nursing School offers no formal Career Planning, so we students are stuck doing research ourselves and the individual hospitals of course have a bias in how they present the costs/benefits of Union v. Non-Union v. NYC-Union jobs. Thanks for any advice. [i'm also going to post this in the NY thread in case they miss it here.]