how old were you when you realized you weren't going to make real money as a nurse

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Laid off pilot use to make 12K a month, sitting in nursing school. That's when

Specializes in Neuro-Surgery, Med-Surg, Home Health.

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My nephew has just started working as a new-grad RN in San Antonio, Texas whose salary barely pays for his living expenses.

Here in San Francisco, California, RNs with no experience working in big medical centers earn around $85,000/year. RNs with many years of experience earn as much as $140,000+/year. But don't forget, the San Francisco Bay Area has one of the highest cost of living in the U.S.A. And new-grad RNs can't find jobs.

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I had a discussion with one of my co-workers the other day about this. She was expressing dissapointment that her fiance who is in the IT industry is getting raises, compensated trips and meals, and has a bright financial future ahead of him while she and I had only recieved a 1% raise (due to the economy our hospital told us) and rarely recieve even a free bagle from our employer. We were both complaining about it. To us it looked like a male vs. female discrepancy.

Later that evening I was thinking about it and remembered that there are plenty of male dominated professions like police officers, firefighters, and public defenders who also don't get very much financial reward in relation to the effort put into the career. Perhaps it is the price we pay to be in such noble professions that serve the underserved, protect the weak, and provide a sense of pride in profession.

I for one would love to be paid more for my efforts, but I also feel that the peace that comes from knowing that I am not making money of off the exploitation of others, or other disreputible practices (thinking of Wall Street/Banking, opportunistic lawyers, and hollywood actors here) is worth something.

Thoughts?

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Specializes in ED, CTSurg, IVTeam, Oncology.

the reason why nursing salaries are low for so long is because the hospital systems work in collusion with the public to keep it that way. public law requires certain standards of care, which can only be delivered by qualified people (based on public wants and needs, that's why nurses have to highly trained ). hospitals will deliver such care, but are forced to accept prices that are low by insurance or reimbursement rules. the voice then that has the lowest political clout will usually suffer the greatest financial burden. that is, the hospitals pass the cost of this expensive care to the nurses.

an md performs an ekg will bill for it, but nurses that perfom the same ekg don't? what's wrong with this picture? lack of political clout is what it is. :down: nurses, learn to speak up; not at work, but to congress.

support your nursing unions! :up:

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Specializes in Med/Surg, Geriatrics.
before i ask my question, let me state that i am highly appreciative of a career that is relatively stable. my question is as follows. nurses, depending on education level, put in a fair amount of time at school, with most new colleges seeking bsn programs, nursing students are investing more time, effort, and money for school. most bsn colleges, range anywhere from $60,000-80,000 for the 4 year degree. most new grads average, in my area, about $23.5-25.5 an hour. scenario: newly graduated nurse makes $25 an hour, equaling $52,000 a year; at best (again in my area), this nurse may increase pay to $29 an hour, equaling $61,360, lets assume for this examples purposes that this nurse reaches this rate in 3 years. the average rate of time, depending on interest, may take the nurse 14-22 years to fully pay off the student loan.

the amount of effort required to receive a degree specializing in this profession is immense. as we know, nurses, even through 'good times', are in demand. with that said, why is it that nurses get paid such a poor salary? aside the effort required to receive the degree--> certification, the work is extremely demanding. so how can such an crucial role as a health care professional pay so poorly?

(yes, i do know many people would 'kill' for that type of money, but in reality with rent/mortgage, student loan payments, possibly car payment, and all the other bills that come with life, a person who spent much effort to reach their goal barley reaps the financial benefits associated with that role)

thoughts?

if you will read through several topics on this issue, you will find that many nurses believe they make great pay, just great especially those who come from lesser paid and less stable employment backgrounds. so how can you advocate for higher salaries and pay if you have a significant number of the group who believe they already make a high salary? you can't fix a problem if people don't see one.

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Specializes in NPD; Administration; M/S; Critical Care.

"However, have you looked at what new school teachers or social workers make? Even in a high cost of living area they will not come close to $60,000+ for many, many years, and they still have all those student loans."

In response to the comments comparing nursing to the teaching profession, you have to consider that the $60K that a teacher makes is over a 9-month period, with 2 weeks off at Christmas, all legal holidays, a week off for Spring break, school called off for incliment weather (we nurses collect disciplinary 'point's for calling in if we can't drive in the deep snow or icy weather conditions).

Teachers have a union that protects the interests of their profession, not of just a particular school. At best, nurses have to get lucky enough to be employed by an organization that has a union to represent the organization's nursing staff. This is the difference between these two professions, at least in the compensation arena.

When you consider the high levels of responsibility a nurse handles when providing patient care/ shift work, etc. for the level of education expected (the BSN degree is the entry-level expectation for Magnet-seeking organizations), nurses are not compensated appropriately, in my honest opinion. Your thoughts?

Sunflower3

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Specializes in Med-Surg, NICU.
I COMPLETELY RESENT THAT STATEMENT. Just because I am a new grad does NOT mean I am completely useless and have no right to ask to be paid what I am worth. I told everybody who would listen about the situation and they all agreed with me. NONE of them would've taken that salary. I don't know where you live, but nursing homes where I live pay their nurses (even brand new ones) in the thirties. $20/hr is NOT decent pay when you've busted your behind in nursing school, you live in an area where cost of living is the highest in the country, and all of your peers are making $38/hr and up. Give me a break. Some of my peers I graduated with have nursing homes and make well into the thirties so please don't give me bull about not accepting that wage. Especially when LPNs starting salary in my area is $23/hr. Because I know exactly what would have happened. They would've given next to no orientation, thrown me out there to sink or swim, piled work on top of my back because I'm an RN, and I would've been doing all of this making significantly less than my peers, and even the LPNs which isn't right. By your logic, they should've offered me $2/hr and I should've taken it because I'm a dumb new grad who doesn't know anything, isn't valuable to any facility, and has no right to negotiate a salary. I really think as fellow nurses we should be encouraging to one another, not talking down to people and making them feel useless just because they don't have the same level of experience that you do.

Okay, so now you are being overly dramatic. $2/hr is WAY different from $20/hr, and I never said you were "dumb". And yeah, because you ARE a new grad with no experience, you should NOT be complaining about making $40,000/yr starting. This would be a far different story if you had even a year's worth of experience, and I find it extremely arrogant of you, in this economy, to stick your nose up at that first job offer when there are SO many RNs who can't even FIND a job.

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Specializes in Hospice.

My sister as a new teacher started last year at 29 thousand.............my husband with a 4 year business degree and 9 years of retail mgt experience (and who is considered well paid in his industry) wll work twice as much as me for about the same pay i make for 28 hours a week of work as a new grad. Its all relative. but if you paid 80 thousand for you degree........well you didn't shop around. I paid 32 thousand for my 4 year which was A LOT for the area i live in but i think its worth it.

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Specializes in Critical Care, Patient Safety.
um excuse me but i graduated in january and i still don't have a job and its July. 3 hospitals just closed in my area with a next one closing today. I have friends who graduated last May and either don't have jobs or just now finding jobs. Just because I am desperate doesn't mean I should allow somebody to take advantage of me. Please don't ASSUME. We all know what happens when you do.

I am a new grad and I took a job because I was desperate enough just to take a job. Not my ideal situation, but it pays the bills and will give me that 1 year of inpatient hospital experience.

I honestly don't have the luxury to wait around for a better position. In this economy, I feel lucky enough just to be working, even though I have a lot of concerns about where I ended up. Still, I do know a lot of people who graduated with me that aren't working because they don't have to be working (they live at home with parents or are getting support from them to pay the bills, or able to fall back on other ways of making money).

So yeah, while I don't want people taking advantage of me either, it boils down to the reality of having to support myself and not go into default on my student loans.

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My sister as a new teacher started last year at 29 thousand.............my husband with a 4 year business degree and 9 years of retail mgt experience (and who is considered well paid in his industry) wll work twice as much as me for about the same pay i make for 28 hours a week of work as a new grad. Its all relative. but if you paid 80 thousand for you degree........well you didn't shop around. I paid 32 thousand for my 4 year which was A LOT for the area i live in but i think its worth it.

I completely agree. My father-in-law is a teacher here in California, and gets paid $38,000 per year. Yes, it is spread over 9 months, but it's still hardly anything. I work for a non-profit in San Francisco, have my BA, and get paid $41,000. The people who work with me and have MPHs and MSWs get paid around $55,000, and put in a lot of hours. It is not even really $55,000 because they are on salary, and put in way over 40 hours a week. I have two friend's with ADNs that work in San Francisco, and make around $100,000.

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I would disagree with the underlying argument that nurses have to put up with an immense amount work to make it though school. For entry into practice, you are looking at about a three year commitment. That's not exactly a huge commitment when considering other professionals who make less, yet spend a significantly longer amount of time in school prior to even being able to compete for entry level positions.

Even among fellow medical providers who have similar degree requirements, nurses end up on top when it comes to wages in many cases. Look at respiratory therapists. The time is school commitment is roughly equivalent, and in some cases more intense academically. For example, RT students at the Associate Degree level in my area of the country are required to take additional coursework in physics and go to school through the summer, while their nursing counterparts have the summer off. Yet, respiratory therapists make significantly less than nurses.

This issue is a non-issue IMHO. There exist other problems, mainly regarding the actual working environment and safety that are more pressing.

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If you will read through several topics on this issue, you will find that many nurses believe they make great pay, just great especially those who come from lesser paid and less stable employment backgrounds. So how can you advocate for higher salaries and pay if you have a significant number of the group who believe they already make a high salary? You can't fix a problem if people don't see one.

What a great politically correct way to put it.

I'm the only one from my family who obtained a bachelor's degree and maybe two of my cousins who went to vocational/tech school after high school. Most finished high school at best.

When you have a profession full of people who either came from a poverty stricken area of the U.S. or a 3rd world country, who think that $30/hr is a great wage because their brother works for peanuts at a gas station or what have you, then yes, you have a group of people who save lives for a living and see no problem here because things are so much worse where they came from.

The problem is that they don't understand how valuable they are and how their acceptance of low wages and working conditions undermines the profession.

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I just keep thinking of the hospital corporation CEO that was fired, yes fired, and got a six million dollar severance package.

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