The Coming Nursing Shortage?

This is very interesting. My step-mother is a nurse, back on the island of Kauai, and the local hospitals there are firing their nurses, not looking for more. Instead, they're being replaced with nurse's assistants. My question is if the nurses are actually providing a service that cannot be provided by an alternative source. Besides, if there is that much demand for nurses, wages should rise and more people will transfer into the industry, ideally. Is there reason to think this won't happen?

Supply never meets demand because price never meets cost. This is the myth of competitive pay. When everyone pays it, there is no competition. Medical care is about as far from a free market as one can get, unless you consider all the creative accounting, cost shifting, and third party reimbursement that goes on the pinnacle of a free market. As complete a separation of provision of service from payment of costs as one can probably get, which is why healthcare costs grow without bounds.

I suggest you check back on the recent "Study" (projected supply....) there have been some corrections made (ex: hawaii state)

This is a very strong argument for free trade.

Our potential nurses are wasting their lives at jobs that should be done in Bangalore and Shanghai. We should allow our parasitic industries (cf textiles, sugar, autos, etc) to wind-down so American labor can be freed up to retrain as nurses, teachers and construction workers. In the process, of course, we would have cheaper cost-of-living, which effectively raises the salary of every single American.

As for the displaced workers, any worker sustained by immorally forcing me to buy their product is, in my opinion, a parasite. They should not only get no help finding new jobs, the pampered autoworkers and longshoremen should refund me all the money they've stolen from me through making my purchases more expensive over the decades.

Not only is this win-win in the long run, it's the only solution unless we'd like to import millions of nurses from Africa to the Phillippines, nevermind what such a brain-drain would do to healthcare in those countries, to add to the millions of construction workers we currently import from Mexico.

Oh my gosh to Peter St. Onge. While I understand and appreciate the shortage of all health care professionals, there obviously is a basic misunderstanding of economics here. To be successful, a country has to have a base of manufacturing to keep the trade deficit in check. I take offense to calling those who may not be as intellectually gifted to pursue jobs that require knowledge of some tough science courses as parasitic. We should all respect those who contribute to the economy everyday by doing the jobs that some would say is "grunt work". They are good people.

I would love to explain further basic economics but I don't think the space would allow.

I don't understand why don't they make it easier for foreign medical studunt to become nurses in the USA. Of course with all the nessesary procedures e.g. grades transfer etc.

hell NO why would we want foreign medical students working here in the USA? it would take twice as long to teach them to read and talk English, then to teach americans nursing.

I believe the wages earned by a RN does not compensate for the level of performance that is required in our every day tasks. Wages should be increased to pay nurses for the level of intelligence required to do our duties. Nurses are the minds, eyes, and ears of the physician who is generally not directly at the bedside.

The shortage does not come from a lack of applicants. The shortage comes from schools. Hundreds of student will apply to schools that only allow 50-100 students into their nursing programs. Nursing is an expensive major for colleges to offer. It takes hospital compliance and instructor wages as well as lab equipment and prep resources for boards. The waiting list for nursing programs in some states is 8 years! We have the willing applicants as well as the need but not the available schooling.
On another note. Don't think the downward economy doesn't affect the medical field. The need is there, yes we know, but hospitals can't afford to hire nurses. Nurses gets stretched thin and care becomes less than adequate. This is not a new story, it's been happening for a while.

I do feel that despite the prediction of a nursing shortage increasing to about 20% in the near future, that there is a dramatic shift taking place. The economy has certainly helped facilitate this. More and more people are choosing nursing as a career. A lot of people, who have been laid off are turning to nursing. Retired folk are going back into nursing. This is bringing a huge influx of nurses, especially new graduates with less experience willing to work for less. Private institutions that are interested mostly from a financial standpoint see this as a boon and may choose inexperince over performance & safety. This is mostly evidenced in the south, in small counties, where there are no more than two main hospitals. Hence, time will tell, and we could most likely see that graph make a positive curve.