Recently, I have heard a lot of complaints from friends who are in the medical profession. Doctor - resident in this case, typically earn about 40K to 50K a year during their training period after 4 years of med school. Comparing to nurses who only need an associate degree (2 years of college) and right off, they get pay 100K a year. Most importantly, they only work 3 days a week on a 12 hour-shift whilst docs (resident) are on call 24/hr a day. Nurses are still demanding higher salary I understand that nurses do deal with patients a lot more than doctors; however, I do believe they're overpaid. Why do I say this? According to my understanding, nurses have nurse assistant now to help them out with caring for the patients. The nurses do the injections, iv, and paperwork whilst nurse assistant deal with the rest - changing sheets, helping patients to the bathroom, regular vital signs, cleaning up, etc -. In some big hospitals now, there's nurse assistant's assistant that's called patient care assistant and their job is pretty much everything that the nurse assistant don't do - run to the 4th floor for the med, go across the street to grab some lunches for the staffs, etc. The difference in salary .. nurse - 100K w/o exp nurse assistant - 50 to 60K w/ exp nurse assistant's assistant (better known as patient care) - 30 to 45K w/ exp So what do ya'll think?
i highly doubt average nurses can make 100k. that figure sounds more like the salary Head Nurses make, but even with head Nurses, i think it's a high figure.
Well, I should revise my posting earlier .. I can only speak for those in the WESTern portion of the US .. Ex: all the hospitals - (UCs, private, and general) in California pay entry level nurse 100K. That's a fact. Nurses are still demanding higher salary. BTW, I am referring to only REGISTERED Nurse (RN), not LVN (make less) or NP (make more). Why? Apparently, there's a shortage of nurses. Hospitals are required by law to have a nurse-patient ratio of 1:5 but most places have 1:7 or 1:10. To curb the complaints from overwork, nurses get NA now so the ratio is 1:10. Still nurses feel like they have to be liable for the patients if something go wrong, demanding more $$$. So hospitals now hire PC for NA so Nurses have even more ppl to help them. There is a nurse union so yeah .. because of it, I would think the salary for nurses are usually high/er than the average living standard regardless of where you live in the US. AND NO OVERTIME .. since they work 12 hour shift, by law, they can't get OT. In fact, they shouldn't even be working at then end of 12 hours.
I ain't so sure with your numbers, gotta provide some stats... However, any private hospital makes great sum of profit, whether they are nurses or doctors... At the same time, wages drops significantly in respect to the public hospital in my understanding...
do you have any sources to backup your arguments? Otherwise I can't really take this post seriously... Also I don't know about the states, but to qualify as a Nurse in Canada (Ontario at least) You need 4 years of college or university education with practical experience. And the nurses carry a lot of responsibility when dealing with patients. For example if a Doctor tells a nurse to give medicine "A" to the patient and medicine "A" ends up being the cause of death, the nurse will most likely lose their license. So I don't think Nurses are too out of line to ask for pay raises when the ratios are around 1:10. However I still don't know about your numbers...
Well .. the UC hospital listed like this one for entry level clinical nurse: http://ucsfhr.ucsf.edu/index.php/staffing/tpp_detail?tc=9140 The privates one don't list them and the public (since I list the SF one earlier) .. here's for the public hospital: http://mission.sfgov.org/cgi-bin/dhr/findClass.cgi?MyID=2320 Please keep in mind .. these are basis standard salary (union agreement means can't go lower but only HIGHER) for entry level .. the salary can go higher depending on the department - emergency, icu, surgery, etc ..- the more stressful one means more $$$$.
To get an RN in the United States, you need to go to Nursing school after a 3-4 yr undergrad. Thus, I do not think nurses graduate w/ an Associate. It is equivalent to a grad degree. The 100k salary varies per place, hospital, and gender in the U.S. Male nurses are now paid near the same starting salary because they are in high demand than female nurses.
The argument comparing the salaries of resident physicians versus that of registered nurses is rather apples to oranges. You cannot compare the two. A resident physician is still considered a student in training; getting paid 40-50K per year while still in training is nothing to scoff at. Thereafter, when they finish their residency or fellowships programs, they stand to make a hell of a lot more than the 100K that the RN gets. Nurses, on the other hand, actually do all the work that the MD's prescribe for the patient. This includes everything from bed baths and feeding patients their meals, to administering multiple medications that can immediately raise or lower blood pressure on patient's clinging to life in an Intensive Care Unit. More often than not, it is the RN that keeps a doctor in training from killing the patient with a wrong order. Similar to how it's been said that "officers give the orders but the sergeants run the army" in the military, doctors give the orders but the nurses run the hospital and care for the patients. That said, not all nurses make the kind of money that the OP claimed. Most nursing salaries annual averages between 40-60K. California is rather the extreme exception because of strong patient advocacy laws that dictate better nurse to patient ratios. In some middle American states, an LPN (licensed practical nurse; in some other states, called LVN, or licensed vocational nurse), can make almost poverty line salaries of about 25K, and not all nurses are unionized. So while some RN's do make 100K (or more) their numbers is by no means representative of their field. Their true averages are about 50K and that's after getting a 4 year degree. There are other nurse classifications of what is known as the "advanced practice nurse" (Nurse Practitioner, Nurse Anesthetist, Clinical Nurse Specialist) that typically make a lot more, but they are generally responsible for a lot more, often performing many of the doctor's traditional functions. Sources: http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Registered_Nurse_(RN)/Hourly_Rate http://swz.salary.com/salarywizard/layouthtmls/swzl_narrowbrief_hc05.html
I am a nurse. nurses typically do not make that much but there are some that do. It depends a lot on area (cost of living, etc) and what type of nursing you do. The are specialized nurses such as Clinical Nurse Specialists (CNS), Nurse Anesthetists (CRNA), and Nurse Practitioners (NP) which are more likely to make that 6 figure salary of 100k+ with CRNAs pulling in the most, average 150k. Again, depending on the area, I've seen CRNAs pulling in 200k. But this requires a ton of schooling after undergrad. If its just a registered nurse and they are making 100k+, they are certainly not in the norm It could be that they are either really old with a lot of seniority or they are living in a high cost area where cost of living makes 100k seem like nothing. It is generally understood that the associates degree educated nurses are slowly being looked over for bachelor's trained nurses. Hospitals are favoring BSN (4 years of schooling). Certainly they will continue to hire them because of the shortage but there is a huge push to make 4 year BSN the standard. Average is usually around 40 to 60k like someone already said.
