Dear Editor,
Boy is this a depressing situation. The nurses are paid less than the traveling nurses working next to them, so they ask for more money or just end up leaving (some to become travelers working right where they started but at twice the salary), which leads to a shortage of nurses but more travelers (and costs) and reluctance to invest in the nursing staff.
Meanwhile the hospital is building apartments since the housing shortage is an easy way to deflect the blame for nursing discontent without raising salaries.
How much of the problem with nursing compensation is the annual mid-double-digit health care cost increase, blame for which is undoubtedly assigned to the demands from the nurses? I cannot begin to keep straight who is responsible for what here.
Bottom line — monopolies are bad for everyone but the monopolists. They are bad for consumers because of increasing wait times and spiraling costs. They are bad for providers who have nowhere to go if they are unhappy with their current employment situation. They are bad for ratepayers and regulators who have no negotiating leverage.
Executives at the University of Vermont Medical Center are doing just fine (well over the 75th percentile of hospital CEO pay) while the rest of us (the “monopolees” if you will) are not having quite as good an experience (a “gentleman’s C” in “outcomes” from the Lown Institute’s hospitals index — ouch).
Roger Brown
Richmond
Read the story on VTDigger here: Roger Brown: On the potential nursing strike at UVMMC.