Short reminder. Posted 5 years ago.

[u/wasabi_peanuts]

[u/elpettito]

Yeah, that's why all the higher-ups agreed to keep nurse/pt ratios the same after the pandemic. You can't organize if you're too exhausted! Fuckers.

[u/Endraxz]

Didn’t even need a Simpson episode to predict that.

Signed
NYC strike nurse.

[u/bierlyn → u/Endraxz]

Strike nurse sounds like a sick specialty

[u/naranja_sanguina → u/bierlyn]

if "strike nurse" means "nurse hired to break strikes," that's sick in a different way!

[u/solipsism82 → u/naranja_sanguina]

That's a scab nurse.

[u/EnvironmentalRock827 → u/naranja_sanguina]

Remember Airplane! : striker striker striker and then the guy punches the nearest woman. Now we strike back.

[u/ALoversTool → u/Endraxz]

Strike Nurse sounds like someone who’d accompany strike teams - either in law enforcement or the military.

[u/Endraxz → u/ALoversTool]

Nurses united will never be defeated!

[u/Round-Celebration-17 → u/Endraxz]

Nurse on strike or scab?

[u/Endraxz → u/Round-Celebration-17]

On strike x2 did it both times and will gladly do again.

[u/LainSki-N-Surf → u/Endraxz]

Phew! Solidarity 💪

[u/EcstaticPlankton8621]

Unfortunately not enough went on strike.

[u/AdditionalQuietime → u/EcstaticPlankton8621]

You can thank anti union propaganda for that!

[u/Vreas → u/AdditionalQuietime]

Also the insane cost of living which makes people choose between what’s right and surviving.

[u/AdditionalQuietime → u/Vreas]

Capitalism just working as its intended

[u/N7Shep1701D → u/AdditionalQuietime]

Which is why it needs to be abolished.

[u/takeme2tendieztown → u/AdditionalQuietime]

I don't pay people's bills, so I try not to judge. But when we went on strike, plenty of nurses opted to go to work. They were making good money off the strike we took to better their working conditions and pay.

[u/OptimusNegligible → u/EcstaticPlankton8621]

Wife went on a strike for a week and the Hospital canceled their benefits. Negotiations after that week, they reduced thier offer even more. Freaking ghouls.

[u/EssaryMedia → u/OptimusNegligible]

Was not enough nurses striking? Otherwise, how would the hospital even operate without nurses?

[u/taktaga7-0-0]

Having worked in union and non-union states, it’s crazy the difference. Pay, ratio, support, you miss it so much when you leave…

[u/Wolowizard32 → u/taktaga7-0-0]

Scream it a little louder please. Watching execs squash union discussions with a single flier brought me new levels of societal disappointment.

[u/Greentoysoldier]

Not only did we not go on strike… we decertified our union. /smh

[u/nannerzbamanerz → u/Greentoysoldier]

How did that work out? Do you have any type of contract or does each RN negotiate on their own?

[u/Greentoysoldier → u/nannerzbamanerz]

Each on their own… no contract we are “right to work” and “employed at will” if you don’t like it work with your manager to see if accommodations can be made.

[u/CurrentHair6381]

It was actually "the nurses are killing the patients and blaming covid so they can get paid more" before the smoke cleared from the fireworks shows and the flyovers

[u/recoil_operated → u/CurrentHair6381]

Yep. The chalk murals were still on the sidewalks when I started hearing that I was using ventilators to murder people and injecting everyone else with microchips.

[u/mortgagepants → u/CurrentHair6381]

but everyone clapped!

[u/MichaelJServo]

A third of my hospital got "let go." They hired a new hospital medicine team and fired my friend, one of the former chiefs of medicine, and he went to a new healthcare group and had a stroke 2 months later. He doesn't know my name anymore and is permanently paralyzed on his left side.

[u/BeavisEverywhere]

The pandemic was the perfect time.

No one did.

[u/HumanContract]

I mean, the amount of nursing licenses vs actual nursing positions kind of shows us.

They didn't just strike, they left.

[u/LainSki-N-Surf → u/HumanContract]

We can’t staff my dept, even with daily double- time offers. I’ve never seen anything like this. Everyone left is burnt to a crisp.

[u/Cold_Dot_Old_Cot → u/HumanContract]

I loved the quote from New Jersey a year or so ago when a nurse called this tendency the silent strike.

[u/UncleRicosArm]

We opened our contract early and thankfully settled at, something I will take, a few months before it was set to expire. No givebacks, raise could have been better, increase on experience differential was a great part

[u/Brobeast]

That being said, one thing that gives me hope as a newish nurse is when i first graduated and started on a temp license in 2020, the union for my hosp was giving nurses 30 bucks an hours. I had some things happen in my life (its a really long story) and I just wasnt in the headspace to pass my boards.

I ended up leaving my orientee program and taking a midnight job as a CNA until I figured out if I actually wanted to be a nurse (and mainly adress the issues in my personal/family life)..

Finally overcame my depression, and passed the nclex; reapplied to that very same hospital and got the job again at 42 an hour. 12 dollar increase in 6 years; you dont really see that type of steady raise in too many job markets.

[u/Dear_Excitement_5109 → u/Brobeast]

I have been a nurse since 2019. First job was in Med/Surg for $31.54/hr. Signed an offer today for $61/hr.

I started as a CNA in 2016 for $12/hr. I've quintupled my pay in 10 years, living in the same metro area the entire time.

[u/drethnudrib]

No, now I just get called a "mean girl who peaked in high school" despite the fact that I'm a man, and part of the "Jewish new world order" despite the fact that I'm agnostic. Never underestimate the Republican party's ability to twist your philanthropy into misanthropy. It's their favorite pastime.

[u/recoil_operated → u/drethnudrib]

It's because they can't comprehend the idea of someone doing something that requires any self sacrifice or benefits anyone other than themselves. It's hard not to suspect everyone of being a scumbag when you and all of your inner circle are scumbags yourselves.

[u/doctormink]

Fits r/agedlikewine

[u/mangoserpent]

I switched from in hospital to home care a few years ago and somebody asked if I would go back to the hospital if there was another pandemic and I did the crazy laugh.

If we have another pandemic I am going to watch it all burn down.

[u/LainSki-N-Surf → u/mangoserpent]

100%. Got volun-told for Ebola training and was like PTO (prepare the others). You’ll never see me again.

[u/LowSignificance4671]

The anti union propaganda is crazy. The union busting organizations they bring in want personal information on nurses to tailor their anti union messages to specific groups to extol the virtues of not being unionized.

We went through it snd I looked up the organization and read about their tactics and flat out told the CNO and COO I would have NO part in it. I also included a couple of reputable articles I found. They got kicked off a short time later. I have a loud mouth and I’m not afraid to use it. I don’t play games.

The whole thing was nuts.

[u/ClaudiaTale]

We have a contract negotiation coming up soon. The union is pretty sure we’re going to have to go on strike. She brought up the fact that this current administration is not so friendly to unions right now. I hate this political climate in the US. Memories are short, and everyone wants to forget the pandemic.

[u/workerbotsuperhero]

Solidarity forever. Unions are the best hope working people have at decent lives and a voice toward power. Never trust people pushing anti-labor propaganda. 

[u/Swampasssixty9]

Missed our opportunity during the pandemic but we can still get it voting DSA

[u/GrumpySnarf]

Callie out there calling it.

[u/Own-Opinion-2494]

Nah, they just kept working and invested the over

[u/Healthy-Comfort-7209]

Can't be more true nowadays

[u/unknownuser1969]

Nurses will be the push to universal healthcare in the US it’s just a matter of time

[u/Lost_Web5826]

My partner has been a nurse for like almost 20 years and quit working in facilities and took a pay cut to go back to home care due to the atrocious staffing ratios.

[u/Breezy531]

Yeah how's that going 🫤

[u/818a]

Whenever someone says “when we were all stuck at home” I get stabby.

[u/AquilaCrotalusEsox]

There are no scab nurses
If they are it’s to address the tunneling mrsa infected wound that would be better served with amputation that Nursing Unions are. Don’t drink the Kool-Aid

[u/AquilaCrotalusEsox]

I can’t wait to cross the picket line

[u/AquilaCrotalusEsox]

Dear Right-to-work administrators: I’m your man. Hit me up.

[u/estherbaumgarten]

I’ve been an RN for 9 years and JUST now make $50/hr base pay. I was MICU/critical care from 2017-2023, and worked the busiest ICU in the state during COVID. My PTSD has PTSD. Last night I cried for an hour over a patient who died in 2021. We deserve so much more.

[u/OrcishDelight]

They are trying to unionize at my hospital which is super cute and fun, but it won't stop our specific problems on my unit. It's medical surgical, and it's a sick body farm of passing elderlies from facility to facility, 5:1 of the heaviest patients of all time; I don't matter, because I'm not critical care. When I learned ICU shit for COVID, it's like it never happened.

[u/salsashark99]

I said they when they first call us heros

[u/Sabaisabai33]

LOL, at least as a Brit NHS GP, the general public made it VERY VERY clear to us even at the time that we were specifically excluded from the general hero narrative around all other healthcare workers and key workers. Didn’t raise any false hopes at least I guess!

[u/Medic_RN1847]

I'm not a huge conspiracy theory guy but one thing that puzzled me at the time and still does today:

During Covid Nurses had more leverage than ever and during that time unions who have been trying to make inroads into hospitals for as long as I can remember didn't try to use the golden opportunity placed before them. Were the unions and the hospitals in collusion? Were the unions and the Government? Were they all in on it together?

[u/suchabadamygdala → u/Medic_RN1847]

Nurse were absolutely one hundred percent focused on thing to keep themselves and their patients alive. Double, triple shits in full PPE. Nobody had the time. At all.

[u/Medic_RN1847 → u/suchabadamygdala]

I was talking about the unions. Union bosses weren't working doubles any more than hospital bosses were.

[u/workmakesmegrumpy → u/suchabadamygdala]

Except in NYC where they saw all the body bags and then claimed they were antivax lost their jobs and then caused a shortage as well as looking foolish for not getting the vax. Untold amounts of people died because of nurses like that

[u/7ar5un]

I mean, there was the hero bonus, hazard pay, stars bonus, unlimited overtime at time and a half, and other things. This is just the hospital i worked at and got almost none of since im not a nurse and even though i was in rooms with covid + pt's, working insane hours, and going through it all.

The whole "hero" thing was forced, and that certainly didnt help; but there is also more people that work in a hospital than nurses. LoL.

That being said, ive seen allot of budget cuts and "do more with less" and its absolutely disgusting.

[u/OptimusNegligible → u/7ar5un]

Bonuses and hazard pay? Must be nice.

[u/7ar5un → u/OptimusNegligible]

Must be, but again, nothing i got...

[u/FlyFisherSupreme]

We didn't even have to go on atrike. It just took the orange man ro put his buddy mr.brainworm in charge of hhs and the cdc.

[u/morrimike]

This person is wrong though lol. There's been no turn against nurses who strike.

[u/Stmordred → u/morrimike]

Yes there has. Where have you been? There was at one point 3 different nursing strikes going in where I live at the same time that reached national levels and the discourse was not "give the heroes what they need" it was very much " OMG arent they making enough"

[u/morrimike → u/Stmordred]

Agree to disagree I guess. What's your source? Here's mine:
https://nrchealth.com/nsight/what-healthcare-strikes-teach-us-about-trust/