Although she originally wanted to be a doctor, Farah Omidbakhsh says she doesn’t regret changing her mind in college to pursue nursing instead. Especially now.
“I have more jobs thrown at me every day. It’s the complete opposite of what everyone’s going through,” she says. The 29-year-old is currently a registered nurse at Cedar Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles, Calif.
Her rent for her Santa Monica apartment is also covered up to $2,200 a month, since she is a “travel nurse” and employed by a travel nurse agency. Her next stop might be New York and even there, rent would be compensated tax-free. “That’s the biggest perk,” she adds.
But perhaps the biggest incentive is the financial security. Omidbakhsh has never had to worry about being unemployed since getting her nursing degree in 2005 from Mount St. Mary’s College in Los Angeles. (She studied psychology previous to that and holds a bachelor’s from Seton Hall University.)
Experts agree that a degree in nursing presents plenty of financially stable career paths such as school health nursing, hospital nursing, home health care, occupational therapy and teaching. The pay is solid. RNs earned, on average, a little more than $56,000 in 2007. The highest 10% brought home an average annual income of $83,000.
RN Demand to Increase
What’s more, as boomers begin to retire and demand for health care soars, nursing jobs are expected to ramp up through 2016, with an additional 587,000 new jobs (or 23% growth), according to the Department of Labor. That’s higher than the national average of all other occupations which are expected to show 7 to 13% growth.
Now more people are considering a career in nursing, with some even choosing to switch industries.
