Fair Wages?

[46Young]

Your medics are getting screwed! I'd laugh at anything below 15! My lowest paying job of three is 18!

True. Many agencies won't start at more than $30-$35k/yr, and require a 48-56 hour schedule to see that income. That's only $11-$13/hr, give or take. 56 hour schedules are the biggest scam if they're paying anything less than $50k/yr to start, IMO. Realize that for every five hired, the agency gets over by not having to pay for benefits, hiring, retirement, equipment, OT for schedule gaps for two people, if it were a 40 hour schedule. seven 40 hour employees = five 56 hour employees. 7 x 40 = 280 (hours). 56 x 5 = 280. They're saving greatly on personnel costs, and then lowball the employees with salary. Any Administative Assistant straight out of high school could equal or trump a 56 hour medic's pay rate ($11/hr, +/-).

I like to compare my former salary at NS-LIJ in NYC to a starting RN. $22/hr starting, up to $26.72 after probation, and $31 to top out after a year and a half. We'll use $26.72 vs a RN's starting salary of around $70k (circa 2006) for comparison's sake. The RN's hourly would be at about $33.65/hr. So, as a six month medic, I was making 79% of a starting RN's salary. If you want to make a comparison in your area, take the everage RN's starting (hourly)salary, multiply it by 79%, and see how your pay compares.

For real life examples, nurses in my area start at around $25/hr IIRC. Out of the fire academy, my base was around $19/hr, plus $5k/yr cert pay, hourly riding pay, etc. That's right in line with my 79% benchmark, even before the bonuses. At my former Third Service employer, I made around $38k/yr, which was about $11.50/hr. Nurses also started at around $25/hr. So, if you work at a 56 hour workweek agency for a starting salary of $38k/yr, you're a sucker that's only making 46% of a starting RN's salary! I was that sucker, and that caused me to leave that situation quickly to get that percentage back up.

Hope this helps.

 

[46Young]

Fairly sure everyone here realizes how a job interview goes. The thread is not dealing in semantics. The thread is dealing in the actual question of are medics paid enough for the job they do. Bob may agree to that wage because its the job that he's offered and he has to take it. That doesn't mean that his pay is commensurate with his job responsibilities.

Sleep deprivation and the stress of being alert and tuned up to drive L/S and then have to make snap clinical/operational decisions mere seconds and minutes after being in a deep sleep (or profoundly fatigued from sleep deprivation) have been shown to have adverse health effects, and have also been shown to be a contributing factor to FF mortality/morbidity. I'm sure the same holds true for single role EMS. Add to that violent EDP's, infectious exposures, roadside hazards, orthopedic injuries and such, and it's clear that we're underpaid. Add to that the mandatory holdovers, the mandatory nights/weekends (a 5-10% stipend is not worth it, if it is even offered in the first place).

Supply and demand is only part of the picture. I worked as a bouncer for $100/night, and I've seen another bouncer get stabbed to death, one shot going back to his car after hours, several hospitalizations after fights, etc. Coal miners are underpaid. Those "Deadliest Catch" guys do well, but I feel the risk-reward is not there, either. Cops in certain areas only get around $30k/yr, give or take. An $8/hr CNA deserves more for the comfortcare, bathing, and cleaning of urine and feces they have to do.

Let's make it even simpler - look at illegal aliens in construction. They'll work for much less than a legal citizen will. So, it should be okay give them the work since they'll do it peanuts, right? How about migrant farm workers?

My county has a bad habit of giving construction contracts to the lowest bidder. Ask anyone about FS 440 when many of the windows popped out almost at once. That was only one of many instances of the lowest bidder doing a poor job. Don't get me started on our RescueNet ePCR software. We're finally going with ImageTrend with Getac Tablets, but I digress.......