Sunshine List

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To preface this, I am a nursing student and not getting into the profession for $. I do look forward to this being a fulfilling career, but I'll be honest I am curious about the salary aspect. The sunshine list has recently come out and I see many RN on the list. Money isn't the only thing in life, so I'm asking about this to get a feel if making 100K is relatively standard with regular not too crazy OT, or you have to chase it really hard to the point of working yourself to the bone.

Nursing Pay Scale per province is standard, so obviously to get to 100K it requires a healthy base salary, and some overtime and shift premiums, maybe specialty differential.

So my question is how do these RN's make the sunshine list? (Public Sector Salary Disclosure)

Is it a combination of many years experience pushing their base salary up and lots of OT? How many hours of overtime are we talking? Working exclusively nights? To hit the (arbitrary) 100K.

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Specializes in Acute Care, Rehab, Palliative.

Most of the ones on that list from my facility are in management.

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No real "specialty" pay. ICU nurses make the same as surgery and medicine nurses.

It depends on the amount of OT available as well. OT is offered by seniority and only trickles down to the new staff if the older staff don't want it.

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Specializes in NICU, PICU, PCVICU and peds oncology.

It's probably a bit of all of the above, password. Fiona's point about OT doesn't apply everywhere. I work in the same city but at a different hospital. OT is approved based on who stepped up first, and then is cancelled in reverse order of seniority. We have lots of OT and I wouldn't be surprised to see several of my coworkers on the list. (They'd be the males of the cohort, with a small number of females as well.) The ones whose names I'd expect to see from my unit are men who work permanent nights and an average of 12 hours of OT a week. The base rate at the top of the scale for UNA RNs is $46 and night premium is $5. The average hours of work for a full time RN equal 1950. After doing the math the base is just under $100K. Add ANY OT and you're suddenly a Sunshiner - without including weekend premiums or statutory holiday pay. ONA RNs at the 8+ year rung have a base of $43.45 (going to $44.06 on Wednesday) and night shift diff is a measly $2.50. $89,600 a year without any of the other premiums... so it's not hard to see how some nurses make the list.

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Specializes in Acute Care, Rehab, Palliative.

Yeah there is no speciality differnetial.

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Yup, the OT on my unit all seems to go to the same 2-3 who are at the top of their pay scale and at the 25+ years service mark. I shudder to think how much they earn.

Mr. Prentice (Alberta snark) better never learn about these healthcare providers or he'd stroke

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Specializes in geriatrics.

Depends which Province you're in too. ON nurses make less than Sask and AB nurses.

With shift differentials and OT it is possible to make that much.

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Ok. I am studying in Quebec and in their collective bargaining agreement, they do have specialty premiums. Thought it might be the same in other provinces, specifically Ontario, to which i plan on relocating. If you don't read french at page 35 http://www.fiqsante.qc.ca/publicfiles/documents/cc_fiq-cpnsss_20-mars-2011-au-31-mars-2015_fra.pdf it says that there is 12% salary bonus for working in critical care.

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Specializes in geriatrics.

Each Province is governed by a separate collective agreement. You won't likely ever reach 100 K if you work in Quebec. They pay the lowest of the Provinces. Terrible for nurses actually.

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