Will the nursing shortage return? (a bit wonky...)

[want2banrn]

Here's my question. I've read a number of the reports, or at least portions of them, written by the ivory tower types who say the true shortage will return once the economy recovers. My problem with that line of reasoning is that it assumes the economic recovery is binary - it either happens or it doesn't, and they assume it will. My question is what will happen if we don't have a roaring recovery? What if we just muddle along for a number of years? What happens then to the nursing profession? What level of GDP growth do we need to get back to having jobs for new grads? If you can't correlate it to GDP, then is there something else to which it can be compared, other than the overly broad statement, "economic recovery"? For example, corporations are experiencing quarter over quarter double-digit increases in sales, and sometimes revenue right now, but that has not led them to hire more people. So, you can have recoveries that don't affect the average working person. That is my fear on nursing. The economy may recover, but what does the recovery need to entail for hospitals to hire new grads?

I will likely apply to RN school myself but I will do so with many concerns. An example of one is on the American Association of Colleges of Nursing, they state that something like 33 additional accelerated programs are in the planning phase and that 230 accelerated programs (bachelors degree level, I believe) are already in existence. I really want to do this but I am concerned when I see things like that.

One final point I'll make. As someone who follows economic data somewhat closely, I know that in the housing market, they track the inventory of unsold homes to get an idea of how long the inventory would last at the present rate of sales. One thing I'd like to know is that in normal times, how long would it take to employ the current number of unemployed nurses? In other words, if things really will get better, then how long will it take to put the current supply of unemployed new grads back to work? 1 yr? 5 yrs?