Nurses Strike: Largest Nursing Strike in History... Why? Implications?
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 25 июн 2024
- 15,000 Minnesota nurses went on strike requesting 1) better patient ratios and 2) higher pay.
It is the largest nurses strike in US History.
Because of the Pandemic, many hospitals have had their nurses take care of more and more patients during a shift. The nurses in Minnesota say they are taking care of too many patients and patient care is suffering.
Nurses in Minnesota on average make $81,000 per year... or about $40 per hour.
Many hospitals fill in empty nursing positions with traveling nurses that make $139 per hour... over 3 TIMES more than what the hospital staff nurses make for doing the same job.
A root cause of the nursing strike is the fact that 80% of US hospital markets are 'highly concentrated.' In other words... there are few choices in hospitals.
When there are few choice for patients (i.e. customers) it is called a Monopoly.
However, when there are few choices for workers (i.e. nurses) it is called a Monopsony.
Other highly concentrated industries that have labor monopsonies such as auto manufacturers, airlines and public schools also have Unions. Therefore, it should be expected that as hospitals have merged and created monopsonies that more nurses will unionize and STRIKE.
To find the money to improve nursing ratios and increase nursing wages, hospitals could look to decrease their administrative bloat and reduce their construction spending.
*Correction @2:12 meant to say 3 patients for every one nurse.
Sources:
www.washingtonpost.com/busine...
mnnurses.org/blog/
nursejournal.org/careers/trav...
www.npr.org/sections/money/20...
fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TL...
www.constructiondive.com/news...
www.bls.gov/ooh/management/me...
www.athenahealth.com/knowledg...
nurse.org/articles/Minnesota-....
AHealthcareZ is 300+ Healthcare Finance Educational Videos.
💥 BOOK: Check out Dr. Bricker’s Book 16 Lessons in the Business of Healing here: www.ahealthcarez.com/healthca...
AHealthcareZ Viewers Include: Employee Benefits Professionals, HR, CFOs, Insurance Brokers, Benefits Consultants, Doctors and Nurses in Leadership Roles, Hospital and Health System Administrators, Health Insurance Carrier and PBM Professionals, Pharma and Med Device Professionals, Academic Professors and Students in Healthcare Administration and Public Health.
120,000+ Views Per Month Across All Platforms.
Visit AHealthcareZ.com to Subscribe to the Healthcare Finance Video Newsletter. 
Развлечения
![[DEBUT STREAM] It's wind-up time!! #hololiveEnglish #holoJustice](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/p_ZQs-kgUKI/mqdefault.jpg)
I love your breakdown of the economic side of why this results in nurses having no choice but to unionize because the options for them to find employment nearby are very limited. The hospital administrators understand this, which is why they resist raising employee wages in every which way that they can.
#Agreed. Thank you for watching and for your comment.
A unionized workforce is the worst possible outcome for a healthcare organization and every administrator will do most anything in their power to avoid that. Important to keep in mind that the wages have skyrocketed due in part to the pandemic and inflation, and that most healthcare organizations have struggled to keep up. This cannot sustain forever due to the economics of healthcare.
What I’m seeing is that the younger generation has been deprived of The “dream”to own a home get married have kids get a good paying job, move up in the company.
Instead they’ve decided to just not work. They refuse to be indentured servants to greedy corporations. I think many hospitals will go out of business.
Thank you for watching and sharing your thoughts.
I hope you work for the nurses union. The patient acuity, the technology and the increase in polypharmacy has made the job even more challenging.
I do not, but thank you for watching and sharing your thoughts.
Hospitals prefer travelers because even though they pay them more they save on the back end by not paying out benefits. The problem with this is it messes up employee morale and Pt care. Travelers/agencies nurses are never consistent so they don't really get a chance to know their Pt's and if they don't like where they are they can behave and do what they want because they will just pick up a new assignment. The regular staff gets mad because when agency nurses callout or no show they are left with whole wings by themselves and know that they are already not making as much as the nurses that "do whatever they want". Everyone suffers.
Thank you for watching. Great perspective. Appreciate you sharing.
AGREE 100%. I am a RN and this is sooooooo true! They have zero accountability.
I'm sorry you have experienced this. I promise not all travelers are like this. As a traveler, I give everything I have on each assignment and have worked with incredible travelers and staff nurses over the last 7 years. Yes, there are bad apples. But you can't tell me you haven't had a staff nurse sit on their phone while you answer their call lights and let them know their patient is about to pull out their endotracheal tube, etc. The travelers are not the problem. Burnout is the problem. Not feeling valued is the problem. Worse health insurance and PTO benefits each year are the problem. Zero efforts to retain staff nurses is the problem. Corporate greed is the problem. Let's not focus our frustrations on other nurses at this time. We have to stay together if we want to make a change.
Hospitals do not save money by hiring travelers. Aside from the morale issues they create for employed staff, they are prohibitively expensive. They are necessary at times to augment a staff shortage, but please do not think there is any economic value whatsoever to using traveler or contracted labor aside from meeting patient/staff ratios.
So I'm a travel nurse from Houston, and I've done assignments in California and Maryland. I have worked in healthcare systems and companies throughout Texas, and the cultural apathy amongst the nursing community there is the reason why I won't ever work back at home in Texas again. The general sentiment is that if you don't like your job, you just quit and find another one. I would like to understand more on why the nursing culture varies so much from state to state vis-à-vis unionization.
That’s a great question. Thank you for sharing your observation.
Labor unions on the French Caribbean island of Guadeloupe actually backed their nurses, doctors, firemen and law enforcement from firings due to mandates.
Thank you for your comment
Our past and current direction of how health care has become overpriced this was directly addressed in the book "Priced Out" by Uwe Reinhardt. He states the same think, we have become Administratively Bloated.
Thank you for watching and for your comment. It is an excellent book.
Doc once again your videos are awesome 👌!
I agree with the comments below.. nursing students start off by saying they are in the field because they love to help people!
Nurses should be flexible. I have move from my home to to where I can get paid more!
We all have a choice to stay or go!
As for administrative staff they will never change. They are like roaches they multiply instead of one getting rid of them 😒. They need a conscious adjustment!
Travelers loose out on their family; building bonds; starting a family . Traveling nurses are cool. My hats off to them. I'm not a traveler but at the end of the day we all have a choice. "Why can't we just all get along"... R.King
Thank you for your feedback. Appreciate your point of view.
Ill add my two cents from working on a CV Tele Stepdown and Gen Med Floor, Patient ratios are horrible here in South Florida depending on the season, very common to be 6:1 Med Surg, Stepdown 5:1, ICU 3:1, COVID depends on patients (High Flow vs Tubed) usually 4:1. The big issue is on the Gen Med Surg floor you have MUCH worse patients (confused, total care, etc) that require constant attention that combined these ratios, low number of CNAs (Anywhere from 7-15:1 ) lead to fast burnouts. That's a reason why they lock new nurses into 2y "no switching floors" contracts so they can't run. Stepdown isn't as bad since majority are walk talkies but because of COVID more and more Gen/Med Surg patients were moved to Stepdown which combined with the better Traveler pay and benefits have caused a lot of nurses I know to go Travel.
Those ratios… Yikes! Thank you for sharing your experience.
One of your most interesting talks
Thank you
Thank you for watching and for your feedback.
@ 2:12 did you mean 3 patients for every 1 nurse? (in my Step-down unit experience it's always been 1:4)
You are correct. My error. 3 patients for each nurse on step down. Thank you for sharing your experience.
Thank you
Thank YOU for watching!
Can't trust your team if you dont know them well enough. Too risky and different work ethic.
Thank you for sharing your perspective.
Thank you for the informative video. Do you feel the traveling nurse agencies are taking advantage of the hospitals? I read recently that several rural hospitals may/will need to close due to staffing shortages and the cost of traveling nurses is not sustainable.
No. There is a market of supply and demand. Traveling nurses are not subject to the geographic monopsony of hospital systems… hence they can command higher wages.
How much are administrators making annually in those areas?
Was that nurse pay figure the cost to the hospital of employing the traveling nurses or the actual compensation to the traveling nurses? I imagine these may be very different numbers given the middlemen agencies in place and cost of travel + temp housing, etc.
Additionally, you point out that the administration of most hospitals has ballooned in size over the past few decades, but by suggesting that hospitals can cut back on a whim, you are implying that they don't have a equilibrated labor market of their own. What if there's some bottom-line cause of the admin hiring that is still looming? Then firing the admin staff may not be such a practical option.
Also, is the money going into construction really fungible to pay labor costs? I imagine it's heavily financed and may even be some corporate investment into future growth, which means making those funds available to pay operating costs would transfer only a small fraction of the value of the investments into employee salaries.
All great questions and thoughts.
Traveling nurse figure is income to nurse, not what is paid to agency.
Thank you for watching.
BS. It is rare that a MS nurse has only 4 patients. MS Inurses get 5-7 on dayshift and 4 on step down. They wouldn't be striking if they had those ratios listed in the video.
Thank you for watching and for your feedback.
Awesome job.
Thank you for watching and for your feedback.
They shouldn't have fired good nurses because they forced the clot shot
Thank you for your comment.
Organized labor has stood completely silent as millions of American workers were fired for exercising bodily autonomy.
Appreciate you watching.
I do not think millions of Americans were fired because they refused the Covid-19 vaccine..
Everybody wants to be a millionaire. Health care businesses need to cover liability.
Big whoop a business offers fair pricing & sets aside liability funds.
Thank you for watching.
Who cares, I am retired
Congratulations. Thank you for watching.