Philadelphia starting salary for new nurses?

[emremi]

Hi everyone!

I'm considering a career change into nursing and doing my beginning research right now before I jump in. I'm trying to put together a pro/con list and one of the aspects obviously is financial.

I currently make about $55k salary before taxes, no overtime, and I work a standard 9-5 M-F schedule with federal holidays off as well as 30 PTO days per year. I also have a very good health insurance plan (pay about $30/month premium and copays of $15/30 with no deductible).

I did find another thread discussing starting salary for new RNs in Philadelphia and it seems to hover around $30/hr with varying differentials for nights/weekends. Since I have no experience in the nursing field, I don't know how to determine what that will actually end up being per year.

For example, is the most common schedule going to be 3x 12 hour shifts per week? Assuming they were not overnight/weekend, would that just be $30 x 36 hours per week, $1080/wk or $56,160/year? Do 12 hour shifts count as overtime even if the week is still less than 40? Should I assume I will be working weekends and nights? I want to be cautious about overestimating the pay while I'm making this decision. I don't want to factor in that I'll be making $70k starting out and then find that I'm actually only making $55k which is the same as I'm making now, but with an additional $50k plus in student loan debt. (Again, financial is not the ONLY factor but it is important).

I'm hoping to get some figures from nurses in Philadelphia who have just started recently and can tell me what they actually ended up making for the year and what I can expect to make if I go through with this.

It may be important to note that I will not even be ready to apply for jobs for at least 3 years. I need a year to get my prerequisites and another 2 years to do an evening/weekend program since I need to keep my current job to pay all my bills.

Thanks so much!

[Nina2011]

Hi emremi,

Most likely you will have the opportunity to work OT. If you are lucky you may be able to grab bonus shifts. For the past year I have been working 3- 12 hr shifts and I will pick up 1 -2 extra shift (1 -12 hr and and an 8hr or 12hr). So far I have been getting $75 for each 4 hour block I pick up, since we are under staffed in addition to the OT that starts after 40 hrs. At the place I am at right now in just under a year I have made close to $82,000 doing this. Not too bad. Also since I started in the ED as a new RN I am still around the 30ish mark which stinks but it is working out just fine.

Hope that this helps you. Good Luck!