Trump budget axes financial aid to Nursing Education

[NRSKarenRN, BSN, RN]

From USA Today

Trump's federal budget would eliminate dozens of agencies and programs

Quote

... Department of Health and Human Services

Health professions and nursing training programs ($403 million): Trump's budget says these programs "lack evidence that they significantly improve the nation's health workforce." Instead, Trump wants to provide scholarships and student loans in in exchange for service in areas with a nursing shortage.

Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program ($3.4 billion): LIHEAP helps the elderly and low-income people pay their heating and power bills.

Community Services Block Grants ($715 million): CSBG is an anti-poverty grant program that the White House says duplicates emergency food assistance and employment programs....

[Avid reader]

Surely, you cannot be surprised? Walks like a duck, quacks like a duck?

[hppygr8ful, ASN, RN, EMT-I]

While I am not a Trump fan (I vote Libertarian) I actually believe it's a bad idea to give out education loans willy Nilly is ridiculous. Why would we provide loans for nurses who want to work in glutted areas where they may or may not find work for two years or more. Give loans with 100% forgiveness to nurses who graduate and agree to work in underserved areas such as Alaska, the deep south, Indian reservations etc for two to three years. Makes total sense to me.

Hppy

[wtbcrna, MSN, DNP, CRNA]

The Health profession and nursing training program is much more than providing loans for nurses. In fact only a small portion money is allocated as loans for nurses, and those loans require a 2 year service in critical shortage areas. This program is designed to help resolve health care disparities and ensure a future supply of healthcare workers.

https://www.aamc.org/system/files/c/1/428928-fy16hpnecsenatelhhstestimony.pdf

[Bellaisla]

Comes a time....when the federal bloat has to be reigned in. The time has come, the time is now. Party's over, we broke, folks. Can't just keep printing money.

[wtbcrna, MSN, DNP, CRNA]

Bellaisla said:

Comes a time....when the federal bloat has to be reigned in. The time has come, the time is now. Party's over, we broke, folks. Can't just keep printing money.

So we are going to give up on science, healthcare, the environment, and give massive tax cuts to people in the 200K plus salary range. Then we are going to increase the military budget that is already by far the largest in the world, and we aren't even worried that the DOD isn't going to follow their own 120+ billion reduction plan that wouldn't cause any reduction in capabilities or cause anyone currently employed to lose their job. That 120+ billion doesn't even take into account the the 500million the DOD could be saving every year just by combining medical services. So let's cut taxes on the top 1%, not require our top funded agency to have some semblance of efficiency and pander to conspiracy theories. That all seems like such great ideas....not.

[MunoRN, RN]

Bellaisla said:

Comes a time....when the federal bloat has to be reigned in. The time has come, the time is now. Party's over, we broke, folks. Can't just keep printing money.

I agree that we need a more fiscally responsible federal government, but I'm not sure how you think that's the direction we're heading in.

Assuming Trump and House/Senate republicans' plans go as they hope, we'll be tripling our deficit spending. Normally, our deficit spending runs about 2-3% of GDP, going up to 4 or 5% of GDP would be normally be considered a big increase, there are occasional individual years where it's up closer to 9%, such as 2008-2009 which occurred in the setting of the recession, bailouts, and tax cuts but even then that was only a single year. What potentially lies ahead of us now is a deficit that is 10% of GDP and it won't just be for one year, it will be every year.

[pro-student]

Trump is clearly the devil incarnate but somehow he stumbled on a not totally unreasonable idea. We do not have a nursing shortage in this country, rather we have an excess of RNs and estimates are that within the next 8 years we will have around 10% more RNs than jobs for them. We don't need to be throwing money at training nurses when every 10th one won't be able to use they're education in this country.

What we do have, however, is a geographic maldistribution of nurses. Some states have extreme excesses, like Iowa at 60% oversupply, whereas others have deficits, Alaska tops that list with 37% fewer nurses than jobs. The suggestion that we tie educational funding for RNs to commitments to work in high need areas is actually one of the best ways to remedy the vast differences between when nurses live and where they are most needed.

The budget as a whole is an indefensible mess but even a broken clock is right twice a day.

[nursej22, MSN, RN]

In 12 weeks, DJT has spent $21 million traveling to his Florida resort. The secret service has accompanied Trump family members across the country and globe for vacations and business trips, and has requested an additional $60 million to provide protection to the first family.

Tell me again about Federal bloat.

[wtbcrna, MSN, DNP, CRNA]

Here is just a sample of government/military bloat: We spend $437 million on military bands every year. We could save almost $500 million a year by combining all military medical services. The DOD decided not follow through with a $125 billion dollar administrative cut that would not have current jobs or military capabilities, but decided to try to hide the report because they were worried that it could effect future budgets if the government knew how inefficient they really are.

So yeah, let us cut educational programs while continue to raise the military budget.

Pentagon buries evidence of $125 billion in bureaucratic waste - The Washington Post