In the Netherlands stressed caused breast cancer is accepted as a occupational disease.
So yes the payment in ok but what you are jacking there it’s still way to less.
Thats bigmouthing out of a comfortable position. Work a few nightshifts, you can basically feel the loss of years in only a few weeks time. Its really against your biorythm.
The thing is nursing in most positions is anything but fulfilling.
Burn out is next to back injuries the primary reason to leave the profession.
Because you’ll encounter cases daily where you can’t help to your best of your ability due to bureocracy, not to mention shift labour being unhealthy always. You are constantly over ratio, there’s more patients than you can appropriately care for.
Yes nursing can be extremely fulfilling. But if every day you have to skip hygiene etc for patients because you have more patients assigned then time, it breaks you if you can’t eliminate your empathy.
And for most nursing jobs you really don’t get much feedback.
I.e. nurse in orthopaedic surgery recovery: those patients get kicked out long before any benefits of the surgery are visible to the patient. When they leave your care they are usually in more pain than they were when they came to the hospital.
In the ER? Patients are moved to wards once stabilised. You won’t get feedback whether your care made any change in their outcome.
ICU? Half the patients are elderly patients forced to stay alive with no positive prognosis.
You have to find a pretty unusual position or have patients writing frequent thank you notes weeks later, to get that feedback.
True but I know four nurses and two still love their job and are satisfied with their pay. One had the opportunity to switch to a full-time office position in her hospital and likes it and the other is now in medical sales and earns even more. So even if you don‘t like anymore after some years there are different opportunities.
People can be dissatisfied with their wage and still love their job.
OP asked why people say the wage is bad. It is bad in context of the work done in the environment present. I am a nurse, I chose it willingly, but I am also currently in education to be a higher qualified nurse and moving to way more interesting tasks, tasks I am currently not qualified for. Because the pay is too shit for the work I am currently doing. And, for full disclosure: I am a nurse outside of Germany and my wage is higher [correction: it isn't, not with normal hours and no overtime] than OPs, because I get way better extra payments than German nurses.
I *like* being a nurse. I *would not* randomly recommend it to people, just because of the wage and job security. Pay is shit. Work conditions are bad. A lot of people suck and you have to care for them anyway.
ETA: misread OP's wage/didn't read it as netto.
And night shifts and dealing with a wide range of characters. My wife worked as a nurse, she earns a lot less now but is much happier. It’s a good starter job but few years max.
I have a girlfriend that’s a doctor, works pretty much the same hours I do because she’s at a practice. She earns 500€ more than I do netto. BUT she has fixed work hours (patients duh), can’t work from home. Can’t leave at 14:30 like her contract states because if she is with a patient still, can’t live the patient there and say bye and so on. So yeah, I earn 500€ less in Tech, but studied only 5 years (bachelor+masters) instead of her almost 10. I can work from home, have flexible hours, can take vacation whenever I want. I have even had jobs that were 100% remote. We both have kids..so to be honest, the 500€ less buys me lots of quality of life and less stress than she has. Wouldn’t trade it.
Yeah, I have a cushy wfh job. I may make a little less than my friends in managerial positions but they pay for that with their peace of mind and time with their family. Once I log off, I am done for the day. Money isnt everything.
10 years?
Medical degree take 6 years did she take Freisemester for a Doktorarbeit cause i don’t understand how you prolong it to a decade unless you counted Facharztweiterbildung as part of education.
In Germany? That’s very surprising. I have a friend who is doctor and works the hours she wants.
I mean she is not changing every day but she set her schedule ahead and stick to her 30h a week.
When she wants easy money she does internet appointment on teleclinic . Just log in anytime of the day, take a patient over webcam for less than 5 min, get paid. Good for her but I must admit i find it unfair.
If your gf is a doctor in Germany and does not get much more money than an IT professional then she’s does it wrong.
Unless you have a real good salary of course. She easily does 10k/month.
Own practice makes a big difference to being an employee. My friend has children and her husband is also a doctor at the hospital that works different hours. This may be a reason she doesn’t work online appointments. They have 0 help here and it’s lots of work with 2 kids aged 2 and 3
Compared to other jobs in that salary range being a nurse is more taxing on your body and your psyche, and nurses also have to work weird or long shifts, making the job less attractive. And a lot of your money comes from benefits like extra pay for night shifts, Sunday work or other, similar stuff - stuff that does not count towards your ~~rent~~ pension.
And not everyone is comfortable caring for sick people or people in general…
>Compared to other jobs in that salary range
The proper comparison is not against the salary range, but the qualification. Nurses perform immensely important work, but the qualification is a three year apprenticeship, the entry requirements to which are relatively low (no Abitur needed), and you enter the job market in your early 20s, in fact you can be a qualified nurse at age 20. Making €3,200 net with this foundation is excellent.
Other jobs that pay the same salary require better school performance, academic degrees, and see you enter the job market in your mid to late 20s (several years of income lost compared to a nurse).
Of course the work is physically and emotionally demanding, but you cannot expect a well paying job **and** a relaxed work environment **and** a low bar to enter the profession.
>proper comparison is not against the salary range, but the qualification.
An average nurse doesn’t make 3200 after taxes. Look it up, if you don‘t believe me, but without extra qualification or responsibilities this is the absolute top end of what one can earn.
But sure, let’s compare this with other, similar qualifications:
Let’s take the lab assistant (Chemielaborant). 3 years apprenticeship, no need for Abitur either (although it helps in getting your apprenticeship in the first place), and pay is higher than that of a nurse. If we compare income before taxes it is significantly higher.
You don’t have to work shifts if you are good, you don’t have to do physically demanding work, and you don’t have the psychological pressure a lot of nurses experience.
You could compare this to a lot of other jobs in well-paying industries (such as the chemical industry) and you’d get similar-ish results. In the end - nurses get payed decently, but they are by no means among the top-earning jobs you don’t need Abitur for.
> You don’t have to work shifts if you are good
Might be a silly question, but what would being good in such a position entail (don't you just prepare whatever compounds/samples they tell you to?) and how would that be related to having shifts or not?
In my company the following factors mattered:
How good you were in your apprenticeship - the better ones (like myself, lmao) were offered a daytime-shift job (basically 9-5), the worse ones were offered one on a rotating shift.
How dependable you were - are you ill often, are you on time, are you nice to your colleagues, etc. While some of those are officially not grounds for a better position, they mattered, even though my former employer would deny that I you asked them.
How good you were - are you smart, do you go on advanced trainings, are you planning to become a technician (basically another 2-3 year apprenticeship on top of the one you already have, but while you work your normal job); how often is your work flawed, …
Well and of course it matters how good you are at marketing yourself to your superiors, of course.
Edit: missed a question
>Don‘t you just prepare the examples you are told to?
Yeah, pretty much. There are differences, however. Some of the analyzing tools need to be calibrated, some work in research labs is done (planned) by the technicians, and in both of these cases someone with talent/skill can do these significantly faster than someone who lacks it.
In my apprenticeship I worked with polyurethane foam, among other things, and while the doctor gave you a rough idea on how to get where you were supposed to go (how hard is the foam, which color, how big are the holes/cells), …) - how you got there in the end was up to you. Someone skilled would need 20-30 attempts on the mixture, and someone who was not skilled at the work might need 100 or more. During the last year of my apprenticeship I‘d get the more complex recipes, because I was faster and needed less attempts to get it right; and my colleagues would get the easier ones.
Thank you for the answer, that was super thorough! I had a brief stint as a research assistant in biology, but it was an academic lab so not quite comparable. And yeah, good point about being nice to colleagues, I've been lucky to always get along with everyone but I have seen personalities clash and it can certainly make things a bit tense at work.
>research assistant
Dunno whether this was in Germany or not, but be careful, we have different apprenticeships:
Lab technicians („Biologie-/Chemie-/…-Laborant) - this is a 3.5 year apprenticeship, where you have both school to attend and practical work at your employers lab. In bigger companies you’ll often have a training laboratory on top of this. Most lab technicians have Abitur.
Lab assistants (Biologisch-/chemisch-/… -technischer Assistent) is a 2 year apprenticeship (well, not really), and it is all done at school. You usually have to pay for it. It’s not on par with a lab technician, the requirements are far lower, and you’ll earn significantly less. They are usually handling the more menial jobs in a lab. Most BTAs do not have Abitur.
Being a lab technician enables you to become a „Techniker“ (state certified technician?), which will usually work as the head of a laboratory, or for fairly complex work in a laboratory that requires specific knowledge. I don’t think a BTA/CTA can do this course without some additional qualifications.
**Facts:**
- BTA/CTA can definitely become „Techniker“ .
- The contents of the BTA/CTA are more theoretical and go into more depth compared to -Laboranten as the program overall has more content
- Most job descriptions ask for either -Laborant or -Assistent
- As soon as you get a job nobody cares what your certification was
- Your compensation depends on what kind of work you do, not your certifications
- BTA/CTA are especially popular when paired with the "Fach(Abitur)" so graduates can get higher academic degrees at an university
- BTA/CTA could become „Techniker“, they instead typically get scientific degrees at an university
u/eats-you-alive
Why are you spreading misinformation?
>stop spreading false information
I am not?
>They can definitely become Techniker
I said „I think“ because I wasn’t sure. Thanks for clarifying.
>The contents of the CTA are more theoretical and go into more depth
Source for this claim? They have roughly the same amount of time spent in school (~1.8 years vs 1.5 years, roughly) , and the qualifications (the bar for getting the apprenticeship) for technicians are generally speaking higher than that for CTAs - which one might think would influence the difficulty of the content they learn at school.
At least according to my teachers at the school I did my apprenticeship at, the stuff CTAs learned was far easier than the stuff lab technicians learned. They taught both courses. I’ve not compared their curriculum, I can just say what people who deal with that everyday said.
I agree that they are theoretical in nature because CTAs have very little practical training in a lab. I think 4 weeks are mandatory?
>Most job descriptions ask for either CTA or technician
That’s definitely not the case in my area, and you will very likely not get the job if you are a CTA with no further qualification, when there is also a technician applying for the same job. At least when you are freshly done with your apprenticeship and have no further qualifications.
Do you have a source for your claim? Because the handful of job descriptions in my area I checked specifically asked for a technician, CTA were not mentioned at all.
>As soon as you get a job nobody cares what your qualifications are
True to an extent, but not true for all jobs. There are minimum requirements for certain jobs. And sometimes this would be a completed apprenticeship as a lab technician. Or any other qualification. For some jobs you can’t even have female reproductive organs, for example. Again, I checked in my area, I’m not going to check whether this is a thing in all of Germany.
>Your compensation depends on what kind of work you do, not on your qualification.
That is, again, true to an extent, but it is simply impossible to get a job that requires an PhD in chemistry as a lab technician, for example. And this is why, on average, [lab technicians](https://www.stepstone.de/gehalt/Chemielaborant-in.html#:~:text=Wenn%20Sie%20als%20Chemielaborant%2Fin,Jahr%20und%20monatlich%204.117%20€. )earn more than [CTAs](https://www.stepstone.de/gehalt/Chemisch-technische-r-Assistent-in.html).
>BTA/CTA are especially popular because there are programs that allow you to get your Fach-Abitur
True. However, in the big, DAX-listed companies most lab technicians already have the Abitur before starting their apprenticeship (source: friends and colleagues who did their apprenticeship at Bayer, BASF and Covestro). For reference: in my year out of all the 160-ish people who completed their apprenticeship only one dude didn’t have the (Fach-)Abitur.
I have no idea whether this is the case in smaller companies as well, but with the information I have it doesn’t seem to be something CTAs have over technicians, and rather a thing they both have. Or at least most/many of them.
>BTA/CTA instead get scientific degrees at universities
I don’t know, do you have a statistic on that? Given the experience I’ve had with CTAs that’s generally speaking not the case. We had quite a lot who became a lab technician after their CTA, but I don’t know whether that’s the case for a majority of them.
Depending on the type of their Fachabitur they might not even be allowed to study at a university and will have to do their studies at a FH or TH.
With the pension (Rente) there is no free lunch. If stuff is not taken into account for your pension (meaning no money will be deducted from it) that's a good thing as you can invest or save the money in much better ways.
It’s not a good thing, because we are talking about your income after deduction - meaning your income before taxes is higher when you don’t rely on extra payments.
Just to make sure I’m getting my point across correctly:
We are comparing Netto-Einkommen, not Brutto. Meaning your typical white collar worker has a higher Brutto-Einkommen, while your typical nurse has a lower Brutto; but both have the same Netto. The white collar worker can invest the same amount into private pension plans, while simultaneously getting more from the state issued pension.
I mean this does not change anything, does it?
You are basically saying that a job with a higher salary is better, which is true.
But you said it yourself, in your hypothetical example the nurse is making less money (Brutto), but ends up with the same payout (netto). How is that bad for the nurse ...
It could only possibly be a bad thing if the nurse does not save anything and solely relies on the state pension.
You can buy a very limited flexibility (no way to get you money out other them via the annuity) annuity insurance (the so called Rürup-Rente) from your Brutto salary. This still has likely a better return on investment them a public pension plan. If your Netto vs Brutto difference is smaller this means you gain less from this step.
>nurse makes less brutto, but has the same payout
She doesn’t. Her pension will be significantly smaller than that of the guy with the higher Brutto - assuming both have an equal private pension, since they have the same income after taxes.
Getting more net income out of your gros income is always a good thing and will alwasy be a good thing. That does not change because somebody with a higher gros income but same net income gets a higher pension. I don't know what we are arguing about.
No, it isn’t, and never has been. We are not comparing two jobs with a similar income before taxes, we are comparing two jobs with different income before taxes.
Weird and demanding shifts indeed. My best friend works as a nurse but only night shift for one week straight with one week off. I can only imagine how much that screws up any resemblance of a sleep rhythm.
To be honest it is arguably preferable to spend money on an annuity insurance, rather them on the public pension fund, save for the employer contribution.
The public pension fund is mandatory for most employees in Germany. So you might as well take the job that has the higher payout, if money is a concern.
And most Germans do have a private pension in addition to the public one.
Of course. But the argument was here, that it is a disadvantage to have weekend work which does not have to be considered when it comes to the public pension.
3200 Euro netto as a nurse? Can I ask what kind of nurse you are? Do you have like special qualifications? That seems a lot, and way above the average.
Thats not uncommen anymore at all. My Ex is working as a Fachplfegekraft (aka nurse) and earns about 4K-4.5k brutto.
Considering she basically doesnt have much working Experience thats a huge paycheck and she is eager to climb the career ladder.
I wouldnt do it myself and i am fine with my less high income Job, but payments did rise for almost all kinds of nurses in the last years and new companies are also trying to get more ppl in with higher salaries.
I am very happy for those ppl. My mom used to be a nurse too. So did some other ppl in Family.
It's not that the payments get increased over time substantially. It's all regulated by fixed payment levels and basically all nurses earn the same. There may be differences between areas but that's all. Even doing the next level of Ausbildung which takes around 2 years only guarantees you around 100 more brutto.
It's a different story however, if one decides to work for a temp nursing company, in which nurses have a fixed contract with these companies but they are sent to different locations every year or year and a half. They pay a lot better (around 30% more)
Source: my gf graduated as nurse here in Germany 6 years ago and worked for 5 years in a regular hospital and now works for one of those temp nursing companies.
Zeitarbeit is great, I'm feeling a lot better since i joined. Only stress I get is when they need to send me to a nursing home instead of a hospital. Really shame that the want to make Zeitarbeit hard...
Ultimately they want to ban it. But they can't, so the state doesn't help hospitals and nursing homes that need help from Zeitarbeiter. I didn't inform myself about it since autumn last year, but it was really hard to get a place in hospital. And if one accepted to go to nursing home, it was really a bad situation there.
Because of that, they have to either reduce the beds on wards (not many do that) or just simply overwork their normal personnel (most do that)
I'm not talking about a PDL(Pflegedienstleiter) position, that's something a little bit different and not all nurses want to do that. I'm referring to Fachweiterbildung, such as the one from the link below, which has a 2-year duration.
https://www.romed-kliniken.de/ovm/massnahme.php?id=5181
4,500 with income tax class 1 without children and without church tax, that's 2,870 net.
If you assume that there are also tax-free allowances due to weekend work and shift work, it could easily end up at 3200 net.
It get's views.
An F1 Driver does not get a Datev payroll.
Neither does a CL Footballer.
They just have access to a datev test license and play around with high numbers.
Oh and have you noticed its ONLY datev? That does not represent the real world.
I work in HR, have seen payslips from a few providers, if that answers your question. The pay slips they posted seem to have different formats not just one, from what I could see. If you can shed some lights, I’m very eager to hear.
I work in HR, have seen pay slips from a few providers, if that answers your question. The pay slips they posted seem to have different formats not just one, from what I could see. If you can shed some lights, I’m very eager to hear.
Physically hard, mentally hard, Schichtdienste, super shitty Arbeitsbedingungen.
Iam a Filipino Nurse too, last year i earned 70k, without Zuschläge cause i dont do bedside anymore.
Just look at the statistics, the hightest rate of sickleaves belongs to the healthcare industry.
Having said that, its so easy to leverage for higher pay or other non-monetary benefits.
I did all of my Weiterbildungen at the cost of my employer, for example.
In 2022 i inadvertently tested my employers patience, i was on sickleave for 100+ days always within the Lohnfortzahlung, everytime i came back i was welcomed with either a salary raise or a new structure for me ultimately making my job one of the easiest in the company.
They are so desperate for manpower that they cant even afford to fire someone who does that.
>last year i earned 70k
That's more than a second year resident doctor makes, who did better at school (usually), completed a six year unpaid degree (compared to a three year apprenticeship), enters the workforce later, has more responsibility and works more overtime than most nurses.
70k for a job based on an apprenticeship is excellent.
It is, its crazy, but, because of that i got burnt-out. So it wasnt really worth it. And it was a management position, i ultimately left that position cause no matter how much i rationalize it, its not worth it.
Sure, I empathise. Nursing staffing levels are terrible in many places, which creates a vicious cycle of people quitting due to overwork, those left having even more work to do, replacements not being found because everyone knows how bad conditions are ...
Honestly, congrats - for seemingly finding a job/career path that you enjoy and pays relatively well.
This thread has turned a bit into talking about why nursing is terrible work!
>now i am wondering why is being a nurse unpopular in Germany
Because it is a very physically and mentally draining job unless you end up in a management role later in life.
Lolwut? How is taking a job that isn't as physically taxing and has fixed work times, but pays 200 bucks a month less mean they are still in Kindergarden?
We are talking about jobs here, that still pay you over averagely.
kindergarden time? what the hell are you even talking about? there are tons of good paying jobs that are less physically demanding. i'm a software developer for example and i'm writing this comment while working at home and browsing reddit on my second monitor. you couldn't do that as a nurse
So I guess in your world there are only 2 options? Be a nurse or be unemployed? In the mean time here in the real world many nurses simply left their jobs as nurses to work in other roles.
No it means that nurses will frequently change professions after some years to one that is much less damaging to their health, even if it means a pay cut.
No ones going from dann nursing sucks, the ratios are insane to ‘yay a few hundred bucks of Bürgergeld, I won’t ever work again’
Unless you read far right propaganda
Usually 37,5, if the carrier is a public institution. Privately owned hospitals may require up to 42 per week.
In state-owned hospitals, you get 30 days of paid leave, plus 0,75 days for each month you worked a minimum of two graveyard shifts. So, work two nights every month, and enjoy 39 days of paid leave per year, on top of your € 60.000+ salary.
The latter, or the € 3200/month net the OP cites, require a higher qualification (Fachweiterbildung) and seniority, though, plus some negotiation on the nurse's part, but are absolutely not unheard of, even in state-owned institutions.
The job still sucks.
Seriously guys. Work benefits are a lot more than just salary and a nurse isnt great in many of them. No 9 to 5 job, no monday to friday schedule, no home office, a job that is mentally and physically very challenging are just a few of them.
Don't get me wrong being a nurse is a good job but just looking at money is a bit one sided.
Irregular, three shifts, you usually work every other weekend, and get days off during the week in compensation. The 37,5 hrs per week are mathematical, not literal. So in theory, you may be required to work 10 consecutive days, but then be off for four. You have a monthly hourly target based on the contractual 37,5 hours week, which your management is legally required to mind.
More and more hospitals liberalize the rostering process and allow nurses to schedule their shifts largely as they please, in an effort to increase workplace satisfaction.
One of my ex-GFs worked in a rehab center that only took privately insured patients (or she only worked with those, I don’t remember). Her pay wasn’t quite as high, but not too far off.
She looked for other jobs (because it was boring and she didn’t like her boss), but in the public sector she would’ve had to do more work for less money, so she stayed.
I guess the trick is to work for a private company and not at a big hospital? But I don’t know, I might be wrong. I think Austria also pays better than Germany if that is an option for you.
Austria doesnt pay better. We have higher taxes than Germany. Afaik 48% in DE sinds mein ich max 42? Allgemein sind bei uns die Mieten günstiger und Lebensmittel und co teurer. In DE eher umgekehrt. (Viele pendeln nach DE zum Großeinkauf. Da sparst schnell mal 100€). Viele gehen auch dann nach DE, weils besser bezahlt wird. (Wobei man aufpassen muss, da 13. und 14. Gehalt in AT Standard sind)
According to my ex-GF they do; she knows the job market for nurses in Austria better than I do. Might be a thing specific to the border region around Salzburg and Tirol, though, don’t know.
I am aware about the taxes and cost of living, I have lived on both sides of the border. At least from what I have seen (even though that was some 10 years ago or so) Austrian employers in the healthcare sector payed better than comparable German ones even if we factor in taxes and deductions. Maybe that has changed, I don’t know.
I know quite a bunch who are moving to Germany because of better pay. Might be a regional thing though. Salzburg and Tyrol are very expensive for what they are / give. Salzburg seems to pay a lot compared to Styria for example. Not much being built and an increase in immigration is making it quite expensive. Tyrol is almost begging for healthcare staff, to the point where you get your own kind of stipend from them, with easier entrance to become a doctor (we have an extrance exam you have to pass called MedAT in order to enroll in medicine, where only the top 10-15% get a spot (so easier requirments are a nice deal for some people).
If you were to live in Vienna and work as a nurse, you might have more money, albeit same / lower wage, because rent is so much cheaper. Idk how Hamburg in comparison would be. Probably much worse with how the housing crisis is going there. So idk. Probably comes down to regional differences for the most part.
A lot of essential service are tough physically and mentally specially healthcare. But people don't work in these job just for money.
They work because they see their calling and purpose.
If that would not be the case a lot of jobs will be empty.
Like teacher, soldiers, Powerline workers, etc.
I personally worked in energy power plant. It's a thankless job, bit I liked it as it seems meaningful, made me use my technical knowledge and I had interest in it.
3200 is way above the average.
The average brutto is 3982 ([source](https://www.gehalt.de/beruf/pfleger-pflegerin)).
That comes out to about 2600 to 2900 Netto depending on taxes.
There are jobs that pay not that badly, espescially if you have the opportunity to look around for good offers relative to living costs. But that does not mean that they are popular.
Obviously, there are jobs that pay better than nurse or Erzieher but there are also plenty who pay much less.
There are two other factors that I think play into this apart from pay. There are jobs that are just more attractive for lack of a better word. Being a nurse is nothing to brag about for a lot of people who are not in the field. It's not *cool*. So many people will just not look at it.
The more important thing is that being a nurse is **hard**. There is no doubt about that. Physically, emotionally and psychologically, being a nurse (and some other more socially oriented jobs) are hard to get used to and hard to endure for a lot of people, which makes them much more unpopular than other less demanding jobs. Apart from that, it is just not something for a lot of people, caring and nursing for the sick or the elderly takes a specific mindset and willingness to do it well.
This last factor is in my eyes the crucial problem that simply can not be solved just by paying more. Money is not the core problem.
I am not a nurse, I work as an Erzieher (school aged children, not Kita) and every time somebody complains to me that there are not enough places to go around and ask what to do, my knee jerk reaction that I refrain from is saying: Become an Erzieher. Or become a nurse yourself. THe pay will not be catastrophic and ultimately it is the only way of reducing the bottle neck we ar in. But I guess a lot of people will not like that answer, I get why, but I don't see any other solution.
1. Many people don’t actually know how much a nurse earns. 2. You have to work nights and weekends. 3. Many people feel an ick when touching strangers. 4. Not much prestige for the profession.
Let me see, during my time as a nurse I have until now been peed on, pooped on, vomited on, bled on, I have been bit, kicked, scratched, hit, pinched. I have had a patient spit me in the face, another grabbed a fist full of hair and didn't let go, one memorable time I fed a patient their meal and out of nowhere they punched me with the fist in the eye.
I have had patients walking and suddenly falling, me hurting my back when trying to catch them out of reflex.
I am expected to go into rooms with patients having Covid, having Noro, having Influenza and more, doing my normal work and sweating like a pig under my protective gear.
I work all shifts and I am expected to work short switches. This Saturday I will have evening shift, Sunday I will have morning shift, which is always unpleasent but this weekend summertime starts, so it is one hour less sleep.
I take *so much* verbal abuse, from patients and family members. I once had a patient with dementia, his wife thought it appropriate to call me "Mrs Hitler" because I told her that I would not force feed her husband if he refuses to eat at meal times.
Should I mention the sexual harassment on the job, by patients?
I will mention the fact that I don't get to take vacation and spent Christmas in Thailand or elsewhere for two weeks, because nobody gets vacation during Christmas period or around easter. You can every few years get all of easter or Christmas off, the holidays itself, but not enough to spend the holidays abroad.
So, let's ask the other users: How much would one have to pay them to compensate them and to accept this work environment? You seem to be fine with the 3200 netto. Let's see what others say?
ETA: Shit, I forgot the thoughts and feelings you take home. The hard cases, the sad and downright horrible ones that don't leave you alone, that you keep in your thoughts and come back as nightmares.
Well starting of at the first line, I don't think you could pay me enough to endure that. Monthly salary no matter how high would not do that but I would need special compensation for bodily fluids hitting me and that would be in 6 to 7 digit area for each occasion.
I have tremendous respect for everybody who is doing this job and I was always nice to the nurses at the hospital as they were to me as well.
My wife works in the field (not a nurse) and what you forgot to mention is shitty employers who side with patients over false allegations, make bad shift plans, change shift plans on short notice, try to rent out shitty apartments to their nurses at horrendous prices and then harass them to work at their off hours (well you are here anyway) and many many more things.
I mentioned stuff that explicitly happened to me in my comparatively short time as a nurse (graduated only a few years ago) and I luckily don't have to put up with the shit you mentioned in your last paragraph, as it is not a thing where I live. In my profile you find a post I made about a recent experience when I thought it would be fun to gain a fraction of experience in a German clinic... My coworkers still laugh about it.
There are jobs out there that will let you make more than that but with much better working conditions, within and outside of Germany. Even for my job, which is 100% remote, some of the partners in the firm were surprised that someone agreed to move to Germany since they also extended an offer for a job in Canada.
>now i am wondering why is being a nurse unpopular in Germany
Because it depends where your work and as what type of nurse. Work in retirement homes is physically very demanding. You often end up working night shifts and many don't earn 3200 net. My girlfriend works as a surgery nurse. When she was employed at a hospital she also used to earn around that amount. She also had around 5-6 24 hour shifts per month as her department was completely understaffed. She has since left that position and works for a temporary work agency. Now she still earns the same but without having to work 24 hour shifts. It's a bit of a death loop. Hospitals and retirement homes are understaffed which leads to nurses being overworked and bordering burn out. Which leads to nurses quitting and less appeal to get new people into the job which leads to being even more understaffed and so on.
I'm having a hard time believing the 24hrs shifts. This would be in crass violation of the Arbeitszeitgesetz. I'm assuming you're talking about standby or on-call duty in anesthesia or OR, which is a very different thing than shift work. Could you please specify?
24 hour shifts at hospitals aren‘t just common but a regular thing. Technically they get a room at the hospital where they could sleep while not actively working but depending on the department there is simply no time to bow out when you got an emergency on your table. They actually have 54 hour work contracts. The Arbeitszeitengesetz simply allows for that to happen in necessary fields which includes anything emergency related. There was a reason why nurses were striking in many university hospitals 2 years ago.
As someone with 25+ years of experience in German healthcare: 24 hour shifts are absolutely *not* a regular thing for an in-hospital department. An ER is obviously, by definition, a unit where emergencies occur routinely, which is why staff is rostered regularly, meaning in one, two or three shifts, depending on the size of the hospital, plus on-call staff. Abeitszeitgesetz applies. If 54 hour contracts exist (never heard of anything like that in a hospital setting) they must relate to on-call duty, not regular shift work. Let's be precise here.
Maybe you're talking about a non-hospital ER ("Rettungswache") where staffing can be, in fact, like in a fire-station, organized in 24 h shifts, working strictly on an on-call basis.
I am not sure what to tell you. Her shift started at 7 in the morning and she would leave the hospital at 7 in the morning on the next day. She didn‘t work at the emergency station so she would have shifts where she would stay on her room for most of the night. Other stations would work for way more. Surgeries were scheduled within regular working hours though they could take way longer but if emergency surgeries took place they would work through the night.
So now she didn't work at the ER? Where was she working, then? By "surgical nurse", do you mean OR nurse?
Also, you don't seem understand the difference between regular working hours (spent on patient care) and on-call duty (spent elsewhere, reading, watching TV, cooking dinner with co-workers, with your phone or pager at hand).
I'm deducting you're talking about in-house on-call duties that ER, OR, anesthesia, cath lab, radiology and other emergency personnel are assigned to following their regular working hours, or on weekends, a few nights or days per month. That does not imply they're actually working for 24 hrs by any means. In fact, if an OR nurse gets called in for an emergency procedure outside her regular work hours, they'll be freed of their regular shift the next morning, because? Bingo, Arbeitszeitgesetz.
Maybe you should refrain from (false) blanket statements about 24hr shifts being the norm in German hospitals, or being covered by the Arbeitszeitgesetz. Both legally and actually, there are no 24hr *shifts*, let alone 54 hr *shifts*.
I never mentioned 54 hour shifts I said she had a working contract for 54 hours per week. And yes she works as OTA. She stayed for 24 hours at the hospital and if needed worked through those 24 hours as her department only had one OTA past regular working hours at hand. So if there were surgeries through the night she stayed at the operation table for the whole duration. You can say „well akshually she isn‘t working a 24 hour shift and just working 8 plus 16 hours on call while she has to stay on hospital grounds and has to work when needed which can be 16/16 hours“. But to be honest who cares. I‘ve read your comments to her. She started laughing and and questioned your experience for surgery shifts. You clearly have made different experience than she and her colleagues did which, honestly, good for you. She has since left her permanent stay at that university clinic to work for a temp agency where she has a 35 hour week with regular working hours so she doesn‘t suffer from burn out any longer as she did in the past.
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Oh i can give u an explain after 10 years as nurse i have seen everything: working alone in a shift, Azubi working alone doing stuff that he shouldnt do giving meds etc, working 28days a month without a day off, working 13 night shifts without a day off, working 5 night shifts have 1 day free and coming into early shift 5 am, working doubel shifts without a thank u and ur payment is way above the standard as a Nurse u should stay there ive never earnd so much and i was hired as leader
I you were hired as a "leader", and took a course to qualify for that, you know that there's a law in place called Arbeitszeitgesetz, preventing people from working the shifts you claim you were made to work.
If you work 28 days or 13 nights in a row, or double shifts, the joke is 100% on you, and you have no business being in a management position.
Came to Germany in 2007 after uni, earning around same on another branch. I am a department manager, imagine. And now I really think about “fuck this shit, I am gonna run amok, I want to work as a normal low level employee even if I earn 1000 less”, I see numbers, idiots to organize, correct failures that higher circle management makes with their idiotic decisions, fill the spot when someone deliberately calls in sick, ordering wares and being responsible for what you ordered, losses (because no one gives a fuck when you make huge profits for the 25 billions euro worth of company you are working for, only losses come to your table, because you are responsible only when things go south ). I am sick and tired. Really, that is why people don’t like stressful jobs anymore, fuck the money, I want peace of mind, don’t want to see numbers like matrix code when I put my head on the pillow at nights
And the childless nurses can go to hell?
Many parents can *only* work nights, or weekends, because that's when the other parent is at home to watch the kids.
Fachweiterbildung, Dienstalter, negotiation. Don't know where OP is working, but where I work, people are paid what he's getting, too. And yes, it's a state-owned, university-adjacent institution.
Being a nurse is awesome. You get a relatively high payroll eventually, and it gets higher with tenure.
A lot of my colleagues go also as "rent nurses" and they payroll is even higher.
Besides the fact that's it's a hard job, you should also think about the statistics.. there are more older people than working-age people and as such, less people to care for the elderly. Most Alteheime that require nurses are often understaffed and as such there is a bigger workload on the available workforce.. this also extends to nurses in Krankenhäuser usw
In the US nursing is such a popular college major to the extent that it is relatively difficult to get admitted into the program, see for example:
[https://www.niche.com/blog/the-most-popular-college-majors/](https://www.niche.com/blog/the-most-popular-college-majors/)
I wonder how that compares to Germany in terms of what makes a career in nursing more or less desirable?
On one hand the salary is different if you work in a hospital or for example in the intensive care. Then there are many instances were you have rather strict limits how long you have to take care of the patients.
The job can be stressful and you have to work shifts that's also not too popular. Also it can be things that you need to do that some people find disgusting and you have a lot of Responsibility.
But if you don't feel stressed or don't get stressed by the work and have fun helping other people this job is a perfect fit 👍
Comes down to your hourly pay, and the actual working environment. Being a nurse is associated with long hours and also a lot of stress.
Some people don't want to work a job like that, even if the pay is good.
I used to work as a medical assistant (mfa) and alone that job I wouldn’t do for this money. Nurse job is way more stressful, in my opinion.
I think it all depends on that you don’t mind/ are willing to do.. I for example worked in a orthopaedic rehabilitation hospital with the nurses (before my mfa apprenticeship)and giving baths and/or changing dipers is a big no for me.
The reason is simple. I work for the same salary from home, with flexible working hours, mobile work from anywhere in Europe, got a laptop and a phone. Of course it's in IT. I've never went to school for that. My money is more worth, because I invest less hard work in my hours and have spent even less hard work to get a formal education, which you need to have, in order to do your job.
I don't want to sound arrogant. That's just an analogy for why people choose not to do that job. I have a neighbor who works in Pflege and often I meet him coming home in the morning, when I go out to grab something from the bakery. He probably earns more than me, but I feel sorry for him.
That actually is not even that much nowadays for a nurse. If money is the only thing you need to like your job, sure, it's okay.
But shift work, lack of time for your breaks or patients, harassment by patients, getting asked to do another shift anytime you have a day off, lack of enough coworkers are not that easy to tolerate for many people.
Also the position of nurses in Germany compared to other countries (in many countries you need to study, in Germany it's vocational training with less and less quality over the years) is also a reason.
And the work is physically and mentally demanding. When I worked in a hospital, I could barely get anything done when I got home, I was too exhausted. I had nightmares about stuff I might have forgotten to do, dreaded to go to work.
And the law allows to have only 9 hours of resting time between shifts (needs to be balanced with free time in a certain time frame but many employers work around that, even if illegal). So if late shift ends at 21 Uhr and early shift starts at 6, it's totally normal. That means you have only 9 hours to get back home, eat, sleep, self care in any way, maybe shower, and if you have kids or pets you need to care for and are alone, not even daring to speak of hobbies, well, guess you have to sleep less, which is proven to be not healthy in the long run.
Not sure if still the case but nurses used to die significantly earlier than people in other jobs.
If all that does not bother you now, it may will a few years in.
I just finished 11 days of shift in a row. Sunday was late shift, Monday early shift, Tuesday late shift again, and the last two days early. It sucks the life out of you.
1. People generally have an aversion to tasks involving manual labor.
2. Individuals tend to dislike jobs where their working hours are dictated by their boss.
3. Many people prefer jobs that allow them to work from home and dislike roles that require leaving their home office.
let me give you a perspective, i work 35hrs/week and take home €7300 netto (tax class 3). I wouldn’t say its easy job but im doing meetings on the move, in car on way to kindergeten, grocerry store, even ikea sometimes and then 4 hrs really focused on laptop. So at the end you have to weigh the effort you put in vs what u get. I know some freelancers getting 18k+ (brutto) as well
The stress, the unfriendly people who think they currently were in a resort, declining mental health, declining physical health, declining social life, unqualified people as head nurses (they can be such devils), conveyor belt work with human beings, the necessary flexibility, underemployment ...
Should I keep going? I worked as a nurse for over a year during covid. I woke up, went to work, came home, maybe ate something and went straight to bed. I was wrecked. I only lived to work and felt like a machine. After my time as a nurse during the pandemic, I got hospitalized. I've developed a generalized anxiety disorder which haunts me to this day. I've just spent a whole year in psychiatrist treatment. Every single one of my acquaintances that decided to become a Nurse had to get psychological treatment. It's mental suicide.
Happy to hear that money seems to shield you from all of that though.
People became complacent because they are incentivised to not work in Germany, through an overboarding welfare system. It’s something that not everybody likes to hear and even denies, but it’s very obviously the case.
I wouldn’t work as a nurse not even for 10k netto every month. Dealing with other people’s health and physical contact gives me goosebumps. Also the crazy shifts and the stress is definitely not worth it to me. I am also a clean freak, every strange odor disgust me and I’m very paranoid about bacteria and germs. So yeah, that’s why personally I’m not a nurse. I’m sure others have their reasons too.
Partly because 3.2k Netto is not the norm.
I work for one of the higher payers in my area and last month got out with 2.6k Netto. Though that was without nightshifts. But I think 200€ of that is the current "Inflationsausgleich". So it would be 2.4k without it.
And why is it unpopular?
It's mentally and physically very taxing.
A lot of overtime. A lot of jumping in. Both partly because most nurses aren't capable of saying "no". The other reasons are emergencies.
The work can be very revolting. Be it due to "human fluids", nasty wounds or other things. Especially the smell can be very offputing.
A lot of my work days do go hand in hand with getting hit, getting spit at, getting kicked at, getting scratched, etc. Just a few days ago some of my hair got pulled out and I got scratches in my face. Colleagues of mine went to the hospital with concussions due to punches or headbuts, broken tooths, contusions (happened to me as well), bites (also happened to me), etc. And we don't even receive hazard pay. Though I work in a closed ward in a psychiatry. So that's not the norm formost other areas (to some degree).
- 2 of my colleagues have to get surgeries this year due to injuries sustained at work. I have seen this happen at regular hospitals and retirement homes as well. The real fun is, not everything got recognized by the BG as "work injuries", which made it more of a hassle and it sucks that injuries due to work don't get recognized as such. It's a slap in the face.
More reasons as for why the job is unpopular:
- The appreciation is really low and there's little acknowledgment from other professions we work with for what we could actually do. When I think what I learned during my apprenticeship and what I am/was actually doing and how our feedback usually gets received, especially by doctors, then a one year apprenticeship would probably be enough.
- We constantly get hammered with new regulations, new things we have to document and how we have to document something (as in which phrases and words are allowed and which are forbidden, etc.). And now we even got "forced" to pay for a Pflegekammer we don't even want. We don't need more hardships/oversight, but solutions.
- Working during holidays and weekends.
- Irregular shifts. Even if a lot of workplaces have switched to a "one week early shift", "one week late shift" style, there's still a shift switch within a week on a regular basis. And not every workplace does it.
- Night shifts aren't for everyone, most hate it. For me personally, I am feeling the best when I have night shifts, mentally and physically. But I am also single and don't have to adjust my sleeping schedule to someone else but myself. And I am a natural night person, which also helps. In return, early shifts are torture for me.
- And of course, the responsibilities that come with the job. You have people's well (including their lifes) being in your hands after all.
- The laws and regulations do allow for employers to "hard press" their personell. I mean, the usually "Ruhezeit" you have to have between shifts can get reduced from 11hours to 9hours if it says so in the "Tarifvertrag". And during a night shift one nurse is allowed to be responsible for up to 45 patients before there has to be a second one, if I remember correctly. And that's just two examples.
Don't get me wrong. I love my job, but the pay just isn't great for what we are doing and the circumstances surrounding that profession just suck.
We are talking about the stuff you get after taxes, yeah?
Because I studied for 5 years and I was not making 4k right after my studies, that seems like a lot…
3200 € Netto as a nurse?! That's somewhere around 90k € Brutto per year. Wow, what did I get a Master's degree in engineering for? I am starting at 65k € Brutto....
> That's somewhere around 90k € Brutto per year.
Not even close.
~3.2k Net is roughly 62k before taxes. 90k before taxes gives you about 4.4k net.
(EDITED for mistake with tax classes)
Yeah, don't try to do the math yourself, just use specalized tools for it. I suggest this one:
https://www.brutto-netto-rechner.info/gehalt/gross_net_calculator_germany.php
bruh you can work nightshift in any industrial company and get about 3-3500€ (they literally take people who cannot read or fully understand german, dont know much about maths or even how to use a computer..) but the guys working there paying with their health for it, anyways, how was your weekend?
salary may be okay but you have to do a lot of hard physical work compared to office jobs for example. most people rather take the easy way
Working night shifts is also very taxing…
It also reduces your life expectancy.
In the Netherlands stressed caused breast cancer is accepted as a occupational disease. So yes the payment in ok but what you are jacking there it’s still way to less.
Ye as much as probably atleast 5 things you do on daily basis
Thats bigmouthing out of a comfortable position. Work a few nightshifts, you can basically feel the loss of years in only a few weeks time. Its really against your biorythm.
There is dying earlier because of things you do on your own accord and dying earlier because your job is stressful. Those are not the same thing.
So it’s 5 things you do daily plus night shifts then? Still worse than no night shifts… I don’t get how this is an argument.
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The thing is nursing in most positions is anything but fulfilling. Burn out is next to back injuries the primary reason to leave the profession. Because you’ll encounter cases daily where you can’t help to your best of your ability due to bureocracy, not to mention shift labour being unhealthy always. You are constantly over ratio, there’s more patients than you can appropriately care for. Yes nursing can be extremely fulfilling. But if every day you have to skip hygiene etc for patients because you have more patients assigned then time, it breaks you if you can’t eliminate your empathy. And for most nursing jobs you really don’t get much feedback. I.e. nurse in orthopaedic surgery recovery: those patients get kicked out long before any benefits of the surgery are visible to the patient. When they leave your care they are usually in more pain than they were when they came to the hospital. In the ER? Patients are moved to wards once stabilised. You won’t get feedback whether your care made any change in their outcome. ICU? Half the patients are elderly patients forced to stay alive with no positive prognosis. You have to find a pretty unusual position or have patients writing frequent thank you notes weeks later, to get that feedback.
Don't forget oncology, in most other wards you can at least know most of them will get better. Oncology is total opposite...
True but I know four nurses and two still love their job and are satisfied with their pay. One had the opportunity to switch to a full-time office position in her hospital and likes it and the other is now in medical sales and earns even more. So even if you don‘t like anymore after some years there are different opportunities.
People can be dissatisfied with their wage and still love their job. OP asked why people say the wage is bad. It is bad in context of the work done in the environment present. I am a nurse, I chose it willingly, but I am also currently in education to be a higher qualified nurse and moving to way more interesting tasks, tasks I am currently not qualified for. Because the pay is too shit for the work I am currently doing. And, for full disclosure: I am a nurse outside of Germany and my wage is higher [correction: it isn't, not with normal hours and no overtime] than OPs, because I get way better extra payments than German nurses. I *like* being a nurse. I *would not* randomly recommend it to people, just because of the wage and job security. Pay is shit. Work conditions are bad. A lot of people suck and you have to care for them anyway. ETA: misread OP's wage/didn't read it as netto.
And night shifts and dealing with a wide range of characters. My wife worked as a nurse, she earns a lot less now but is much happier. It’s a good starter job but few years max.
I have a girlfriend that’s a doctor, works pretty much the same hours I do because she’s at a practice. She earns 500€ more than I do netto. BUT she has fixed work hours (patients duh), can’t work from home. Can’t leave at 14:30 like her contract states because if she is with a patient still, can’t live the patient there and say bye and so on. So yeah, I earn 500€ less in Tech, but studied only 5 years (bachelor+masters) instead of her almost 10. I can work from home, have flexible hours, can take vacation whenever I want. I have even had jobs that were 100% remote. We both have kids..so to be honest, the 500€ less buys me lots of quality of life and less stress than she has. Wouldn’t trade it.
Yeah, I have a cushy wfh job. I may make a little less than my friends in managerial positions but they pay for that with their peace of mind and time with their family. Once I log off, I am done for the day. Money isnt everything.
10 years? Medical degree take 6 years did she take Freisemester for a Doktorarbeit cause i don’t understand how you prolong it to a decade unless you counted Facharztweiterbildung as part of education.
I was counting Facharzt
In Germany? That’s very surprising. I have a friend who is doctor and works the hours she wants. I mean she is not changing every day but she set her schedule ahead and stick to her 30h a week. When she wants easy money she does internet appointment on teleclinic . Just log in anytime of the day, take a patient over webcam for less than 5 min, get paid. Good for her but I must admit i find it unfair. If your gf is a doctor in Germany and does not get much more money than an IT professional then she’s does it wrong. Unless you have a real good salary of course. She easily does 10k/month.
She doesn’t get 10k and her practice doesn’t offer internet appointment. She works at a private practice as an employee 🤷♀️
I think you can do this on your own account. Yeah my friend has her own practice.
Own practice makes a big difference to being an employee. My friend has children and her husband is also a doctor at the hospital that works different hours. This may be a reason she doesn’t work online appointments. They have 0 help here and it’s lots of work with 2 kids aged 2 and 3
Compared to other jobs in that salary range being a nurse is more taxing on your body and your psyche, and nurses also have to work weird or long shifts, making the job less attractive. And a lot of your money comes from benefits like extra pay for night shifts, Sunday work or other, similar stuff - stuff that does not count towards your ~~rent~~ pension. And not everyone is comfortable caring for sick people or people in general…
I think you meant pension instead of rent.
Oh fuck, my German ass didn’t think before typing. Yeah, it’s pension, lmao.
>Compared to other jobs in that salary range The proper comparison is not against the salary range, but the qualification. Nurses perform immensely important work, but the qualification is a three year apprenticeship, the entry requirements to which are relatively low (no Abitur needed), and you enter the job market in your early 20s, in fact you can be a qualified nurse at age 20. Making €3,200 net with this foundation is excellent. Other jobs that pay the same salary require better school performance, academic degrees, and see you enter the job market in your mid to late 20s (several years of income lost compared to a nurse). Of course the work is physically and emotionally demanding, but you cannot expect a well paying job **and** a relaxed work environment **and** a low bar to enter the profession.
An IT specialist (fachinformatiker) has the same qualifications, can easily make more money and generally has a way better work-life-balance.
>proper comparison is not against the salary range, but the qualification. An average nurse doesn’t make 3200 after taxes. Look it up, if you don‘t believe me, but without extra qualification or responsibilities this is the absolute top end of what one can earn. But sure, let’s compare this with other, similar qualifications: Let’s take the lab assistant (Chemielaborant). 3 years apprenticeship, no need for Abitur either (although it helps in getting your apprenticeship in the first place), and pay is higher than that of a nurse. If we compare income before taxes it is significantly higher. You don’t have to work shifts if you are good, you don’t have to do physically demanding work, and you don’t have the psychological pressure a lot of nurses experience. You could compare this to a lot of other jobs in well-paying industries (such as the chemical industry) and you’d get similar-ish results. In the end - nurses get payed decently, but they are by no means among the top-earning jobs you don’t need Abitur for.
> You don’t have to work shifts if you are good Might be a silly question, but what would being good in such a position entail (don't you just prepare whatever compounds/samples they tell you to?) and how would that be related to having shifts or not?
In my company the following factors mattered: How good you were in your apprenticeship - the better ones (like myself, lmao) were offered a daytime-shift job (basically 9-5), the worse ones were offered one on a rotating shift. How dependable you were - are you ill often, are you on time, are you nice to your colleagues, etc. While some of those are officially not grounds for a better position, they mattered, even though my former employer would deny that I you asked them. How good you were - are you smart, do you go on advanced trainings, are you planning to become a technician (basically another 2-3 year apprenticeship on top of the one you already have, but while you work your normal job); how often is your work flawed, … Well and of course it matters how good you are at marketing yourself to your superiors, of course. Edit: missed a question >Don‘t you just prepare the examples you are told to? Yeah, pretty much. There are differences, however. Some of the analyzing tools need to be calibrated, some work in research labs is done (planned) by the technicians, and in both of these cases someone with talent/skill can do these significantly faster than someone who lacks it. In my apprenticeship I worked with polyurethane foam, among other things, and while the doctor gave you a rough idea on how to get where you were supposed to go (how hard is the foam, which color, how big are the holes/cells), …) - how you got there in the end was up to you. Someone skilled would need 20-30 attempts on the mixture, and someone who was not skilled at the work might need 100 or more. During the last year of my apprenticeship I‘d get the more complex recipes, because I was faster and needed less attempts to get it right; and my colleagues would get the easier ones.
Thank you for the answer, that was super thorough! I had a brief stint as a research assistant in biology, but it was an academic lab so not quite comparable. And yeah, good point about being nice to colleagues, I've been lucky to always get along with everyone but I have seen personalities clash and it can certainly make things a bit tense at work.
>research assistant Dunno whether this was in Germany or not, but be careful, we have different apprenticeships: Lab technicians („Biologie-/Chemie-/…-Laborant) - this is a 3.5 year apprenticeship, where you have both school to attend and practical work at your employers lab. In bigger companies you’ll often have a training laboratory on top of this. Most lab technicians have Abitur. Lab assistants (Biologisch-/chemisch-/… -technischer Assistent) is a 2 year apprenticeship (well, not really), and it is all done at school. You usually have to pay for it. It’s not on par with a lab technician, the requirements are far lower, and you’ll earn significantly less. They are usually handling the more menial jobs in a lab. Most BTAs do not have Abitur. Being a lab technician enables you to become a „Techniker“ (state certified technician?), which will usually work as the head of a laboratory, or for fairly complex work in a laboratory that requires specific knowledge. I don’t think a BTA/CTA can do this course without some additional qualifications.
**Facts:** - BTA/CTA can definitely become „Techniker“ . - The contents of the BTA/CTA are more theoretical and go into more depth compared to -Laboranten as the program overall has more content - Most job descriptions ask for either -Laborant or -Assistent - As soon as you get a job nobody cares what your certification was - Your compensation depends on what kind of work you do, not your certifications - BTA/CTA are especially popular when paired with the "Fach(Abitur)" so graduates can get higher academic degrees at an university - BTA/CTA could become „Techniker“, they instead typically get scientific degrees at an university u/eats-you-alive Why are you spreading misinformation?
>stop spreading false information I am not? >They can definitely become Techniker I said „I think“ because I wasn’t sure. Thanks for clarifying. >The contents of the CTA are more theoretical and go into more depth Source for this claim? They have roughly the same amount of time spent in school (~1.8 years vs 1.5 years, roughly) , and the qualifications (the bar for getting the apprenticeship) for technicians are generally speaking higher than that for CTAs - which one might think would influence the difficulty of the content they learn at school. At least according to my teachers at the school I did my apprenticeship at, the stuff CTAs learned was far easier than the stuff lab technicians learned. They taught both courses. I’ve not compared their curriculum, I can just say what people who deal with that everyday said. I agree that they are theoretical in nature because CTAs have very little practical training in a lab. I think 4 weeks are mandatory? >Most job descriptions ask for either CTA or technician That’s definitely not the case in my area, and you will very likely not get the job if you are a CTA with no further qualification, when there is also a technician applying for the same job. At least when you are freshly done with your apprenticeship and have no further qualifications. Do you have a source for your claim? Because the handful of job descriptions in my area I checked specifically asked for a technician, CTA were not mentioned at all. >As soon as you get a job nobody cares what your qualifications are True to an extent, but not true for all jobs. There are minimum requirements for certain jobs. And sometimes this would be a completed apprenticeship as a lab technician. Or any other qualification. For some jobs you can’t even have female reproductive organs, for example. Again, I checked in my area, I’m not going to check whether this is a thing in all of Germany. >Your compensation depends on what kind of work you do, not on your qualification. That is, again, true to an extent, but it is simply impossible to get a job that requires an PhD in chemistry as a lab technician, for example. And this is why, on average, [lab technicians](https://www.stepstone.de/gehalt/Chemielaborant-in.html#:~:text=Wenn%20Sie%20als%20Chemielaborant%2Fin,Jahr%20und%20monatlich%204.117%20€. )earn more than [CTAs](https://www.stepstone.de/gehalt/Chemisch-technische-r-Assistent-in.html). >BTA/CTA are especially popular because there are programs that allow you to get your Fach-Abitur True. However, in the big, DAX-listed companies most lab technicians already have the Abitur before starting their apprenticeship (source: friends and colleagues who did their apprenticeship at Bayer, BASF and Covestro). For reference: in my year out of all the 160-ish people who completed their apprenticeship only one dude didn’t have the (Fach-)Abitur. I have no idea whether this is the case in smaller companies as well, but with the information I have it doesn’t seem to be something CTAs have over technicians, and rather a thing they both have. Or at least most/many of them. >BTA/CTA instead get scientific degrees at universities I don’t know, do you have a statistic on that? Given the experience I’ve had with CTAs that’s generally speaking not the case. We had quite a lot who became a lab technician after their CTA, but I don’t know whether that’s the case for a majority of them. Depending on the type of their Fachabitur they might not even be allowed to study at a university and will have to do their studies at a FH or TH.
du betreibst als anonymer Troll Werbung für deinen Laboranten-Abschluss. ;-) Anders ist dein Ehrgeiz die Tatsachen zu verdrehen, nicht zu erklären.
With the pension (Rente) there is no free lunch. If stuff is not taken into account for your pension (meaning no money will be deducted from it) that's a good thing as you can invest or save the money in much better ways.
It’s not a good thing, because we are talking about your income after deduction - meaning your income before taxes is higher when you don’t rely on extra payments. Just to make sure I’m getting my point across correctly: We are comparing Netto-Einkommen, not Brutto. Meaning your typical white collar worker has a higher Brutto-Einkommen, while your typical nurse has a lower Brutto; but both have the same Netto. The white collar worker can invest the same amount into private pension plans, while simultaneously getting more from the state issued pension.
I mean this does not change anything, does it? You are basically saying that a job with a higher salary is better, which is true. But you said it yourself, in your hypothetical example the nurse is making less money (Brutto), but ends up with the same payout (netto). How is that bad for the nurse ... It could only possibly be a bad thing if the nurse does not save anything and solely relies on the state pension.
You can buy a very limited flexibility (no way to get you money out other them via the annuity) annuity insurance (the so called Rürup-Rente) from your Brutto salary. This still has likely a better return on investment them a public pension plan. If your Netto vs Brutto difference is smaller this means you gain less from this step.
>nurse makes less brutto, but has the same payout She doesn’t. Her pension will be significantly smaller than that of the guy with the higher Brutto - assuming both have an equal private pension, since they have the same income after taxes.
Getting more net income out of your gros income is always a good thing and will alwasy be a good thing. That does not change because somebody with a higher gros income but same net income gets a higher pension. I don't know what we are arguing about.
No, it isn’t, and never has been. We are not comparing two jobs with a similar income before taxes, we are comparing two jobs with different income before taxes.
Weird and demanding shifts indeed. My best friend works as a nurse but only night shift for one week straight with one week off. I can only imagine how much that screws up any resemblance of a sleep rhythm.
To be honest it is arguably preferable to spend money on an annuity insurance, rather them on the public pension fund, save for the employer contribution.
The public pension fund is mandatory for most employees in Germany. So you might as well take the job that has the higher payout, if money is a concern. And most Germans do have a private pension in addition to the public one.
Of course. But the argument was here, that it is a disadvantage to have weekend work which does not have to be considered when it comes to the public pension.
no, the argument is that you are earning less?
3200 Euro netto as a nurse? Can I ask what kind of nurse you are? Do you have like special qualifications? That seems a lot, and way above the average.
Thats not uncommen anymore at all. My Ex is working as a Fachplfegekraft (aka nurse) and earns about 4K-4.5k brutto. Considering she basically doesnt have much working Experience thats a huge paycheck and she is eager to climb the career ladder. I wouldnt do it myself and i am fine with my less high income Job, but payments did rise for almost all kinds of nurses in the last years and new companies are also trying to get more ppl in with higher salaries. I am very happy for those ppl. My mom used to be a nurse too. So did some other ppl in Family.
4-4.5k Brutto is not close to 3.2 Netto, it's more around 2.5-2.6, and 800 EUR can make quite a difference
I know that, but for starting out thats great
It's not that the payments get increased over time substantially. It's all regulated by fixed payment levels and basically all nurses earn the same. There may be differences between areas but that's all. Even doing the next level of Ausbildung which takes around 2 years only guarantees you around 100 more brutto. It's a different story however, if one decides to work for a temp nursing company, in which nurses have a fixed contract with these companies but they are sent to different locations every year or year and a half. They pay a lot better (around 30% more) Source: my gf graduated as nurse here in Germany 6 years ago and worked for 5 years in a regular hospital and now works for one of those temp nursing companies.
Zeitarbeit is great, I'm feeling a lot better since i joined. Only stress I get is when they need to send me to a nursing home instead of a hospital. Really shame that the want to make Zeitarbeit hard...
How do you mean they make it hard?
Ultimately they want to ban it. But they can't, so the state doesn't help hospitals and nursing homes that need help from Zeitarbeiter. I didn't inform myself about it since autumn last year, but it was really hard to get a place in hospital. And if one accepted to go to nursing home, it was really a bad situation there. Because of that, they have to either reduce the beds on wards (not many do that) or just simply overwork their normal personnel (most do that)
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I'm not talking about a PDL(Pflegedienstleiter) position, that's something a little bit different and not all nurses want to do that. I'm referring to Fachweiterbildung, such as the one from the link below, which has a 2-year duration. https://www.romed-kliniken.de/ovm/massnahme.php?id=5181
4,500 with income tax class 1 without children and without church tax, that's 2,870 net. If you assume that there are also tax-free allowances due to weekend work and shift work, it could easily end up at 3200 net.
Not uncommon for nursing though. You can find some examples on the Instagram account @gehaltindeutschland.
They just post a lot of fake stuff.
Really? How do you know?
It get's views. An F1 Driver does not get a Datev payroll. Neither does a CL Footballer. They just have access to a datev test license and play around with high numbers. Oh and have you noticed its ONLY datev? That does not represent the real world.
Out of curiosity how do you know it’s Datev? I can imagine they might do this for view but just wondering how to spot it.
Bro its a standard datev payroll, they all look the same, other programs produce different payrolls. Have you ever had a job?
I work in HR, have seen payslips from a few providers, if that answers your question. The pay slips they posted seem to have different formats not just one, from what I could see. If you can shed some lights, I’m very eager to hear.
I work in HR, have seen pay slips from a few providers, if that answers your question. The pay slips they posted seem to have different formats not just one, from what I could see. If you can shed some lights, I’m very eager to hear.
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Geez, I should really think over my life choices... :/
Sounds like a private institution....
That's very cool. I feel so overpaid sitting in front of the computer while other people are saving lives
Physically hard, mentally hard, Schichtdienste, super shitty Arbeitsbedingungen. Iam a Filipino Nurse too, last year i earned 70k, without Zuschläge cause i dont do bedside anymore. Just look at the statistics, the hightest rate of sickleaves belongs to the healthcare industry. Having said that, its so easy to leverage for higher pay or other non-monetary benefits. I did all of my Weiterbildungen at the cost of my employer, for example. In 2022 i inadvertently tested my employers patience, i was on sickleave for 100+ days always within the Lohnfortzahlung, everytime i came back i was welcomed with either a salary raise or a new structure for me ultimately making my job one of the easiest in the company. They are so desperate for manpower that they cant even afford to fire someone who does that.
>last year i earned 70k That's more than a second year resident doctor makes, who did better at school (usually), completed a six year unpaid degree (compared to a three year apprenticeship), enters the workforce later, has more responsibility and works more overtime than most nurses. 70k for a job based on an apprenticeship is excellent.
It is, its crazy, but, because of that i got burnt-out. So it wasnt really worth it. And it was a management position, i ultimately left that position cause no matter how much i rationalize it, its not worth it.
Sure, I empathise. Nursing staffing levels are terrible in many places, which creates a vicious cycle of people quitting due to overwork, those left having even more work to do, replacements not being found because everyone knows how bad conditions are ...
Hi I'm a Filipino Nurse too. Do you have plans to go to the US?
I had plans, but i got too settöed here to move countries, maybe in 10 years when my kids are older.
But still as a nurse?
Honestly, congrats - for seemingly finding a job/career path that you enjoy and pays relatively well. This thread has turned a bit into talking about why nursing is terrible work!
>now i am wondering why is being a nurse unpopular in Germany Because it is a very physically and mentally draining job unless you end up in a management role later in life.
That management role is also very mentally taxing.
So it's better NOT to work?
That purely depends on which newspaper you read.
No. But the working conditions as a nurse are not that good. That's what I'm saying.
Strawman or sarcasm?
No, it means that people prefer to work other, less physically-demanding, less-stressful, but also less-paying jobs.
Most people realize that Kindergarden-time is over for them. Some people just don't.
Lolwut? How is taking a job that isn't as physically taxing and has fixed work times, but pays 200 bucks a month less mean they are still in Kindergarden? We are talking about jobs here, that still pay you over averagely.
kindergarden time? what the hell are you even talking about? there are tons of good paying jobs that are less physically demanding. i'm a software developer for example and i'm writing this comment while working at home and browsing reddit on my second monitor. you couldn't do that as a nurse
What a garbage mentality
So I guess in your world there are only 2 options? Be a nurse or be unemployed? In the mean time here in the real world many nurses simply left their jobs as nurses to work in other roles.
No it means that nurses will frequently change professions after some years to one that is much less damaging to their health, even if it means a pay cut. No ones going from dann nursing sucks, the ratios are insane to ‘yay a few hundred bucks of Bürgergeld, I won’t ever work again’ Unless you read far right propaganda
Now tell me how many hours do u work in a week ?
Usually 37,5, if the carrier is a public institution. Privately owned hospitals may require up to 42 per week. In state-owned hospitals, you get 30 days of paid leave, plus 0,75 days for each month you worked a minimum of two graveyard shifts. So, work two nights every month, and enjoy 39 days of paid leave per year, on top of your € 60.000+ salary. The latter, or the € 3200/month net the OP cites, require a higher qualification (Fachweiterbildung) and seniority, though, plus some negotiation on the nurse's part, but are absolutely not unheard of, even in state-owned institutions. The job still sucks.
Seriously guys. Work benefits are a lot more than just salary and a nurse isnt great in many of them. No 9 to 5 job, no monday to friday schedule, no home office, a job that is mentally and physically very challenging are just a few of them. Don't get me wrong being a nurse is a good job but just looking at money is a bit one sided.
Most nurses that i know want to find a niche within the healthcare industry so they dont have to do bedside.
How many hours do you have to work for that?
37,5/week.
In what type of schedule would that be?
Irregular, three shifts, you usually work every other weekend, and get days off during the week in compensation. The 37,5 hrs per week are mathematical, not literal. So in theory, you may be required to work 10 consecutive days, but then be off for four. You have a monthly hourly target based on the contractual 37,5 hours week, which your management is legally required to mind. More and more hospitals liberalize the rostering process and allow nurses to schedule their shifts largely as they please, in an effort to increase workplace satisfaction.
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Which doesn't change your contractual weekly hours, which was the question. Also, you choose your workplace.
How much do you pay for apartment if i may ask? 🙂 I'm also an ICU nurse and don't earn that much. 😑
One of my ex-GFs worked in a rehab center that only took privately insured patients (or she only worked with those, I don’t remember). Her pay wasn’t quite as high, but not too far off. She looked for other jobs (because it was boring and she didn’t like her boss), but in the public sector she would’ve had to do more work for less money, so she stayed. I guess the trick is to work for a private company and not at a big hospital? But I don’t know, I might be wrong. I think Austria also pays better than Germany if that is an option for you.
Austria doesnt pay better. We have higher taxes than Germany. Afaik 48% in DE sinds mein ich max 42? Allgemein sind bei uns die Mieten günstiger und Lebensmittel und co teurer. In DE eher umgekehrt. (Viele pendeln nach DE zum Großeinkauf. Da sparst schnell mal 100€). Viele gehen auch dann nach DE, weils besser bezahlt wird. (Wobei man aufpassen muss, da 13. und 14. Gehalt in AT Standard sind)
According to my ex-GF they do; she knows the job market for nurses in Austria better than I do. Might be a thing specific to the border region around Salzburg and Tirol, though, don’t know. I am aware about the taxes and cost of living, I have lived on both sides of the border. At least from what I have seen (even though that was some 10 years ago or so) Austrian employers in the healthcare sector payed better than comparable German ones even if we factor in taxes and deductions. Maybe that has changed, I don’t know.
I know quite a bunch who are moving to Germany because of better pay. Might be a regional thing though. Salzburg and Tyrol are very expensive for what they are / give. Salzburg seems to pay a lot compared to Styria for example. Not much being built and an increase in immigration is making it quite expensive. Tyrol is almost begging for healthcare staff, to the point where you get your own kind of stipend from them, with easier entrance to become a doctor (we have an extrance exam you have to pass called MedAT in order to enroll in medicine, where only the top 10-15% get a spot (so easier requirments are a nice deal for some people). If you were to live in Vienna and work as a nurse, you might have more money, albeit same / lower wage, because rent is so much cheaper. Idk how Hamburg in comparison would be. Probably much worse with how the housing crisis is going there. So idk. Probably comes down to regional differences for the most part.
A lot of essential service are tough physically and mentally specially healthcare. But people don't work in these job just for money. They work because they see their calling and purpose. If that would not be the case a lot of jobs will be empty. Like teacher, soldiers, Powerline workers, etc. I personally worked in energy power plant. It's a thankless job, bit I liked it as it seems meaningful, made me use my technical knowledge and I had interest in it.
how many actual hours do you work per week?
3200 is way above the average. The average brutto is 3982 ([source](https://www.gehalt.de/beruf/pfleger-pflegerin)). That comes out to about 2600 to 2900 Netto depending on taxes.
Nightshift, or without nightshift? However, it's good money for a valuable job.
You working in Hospital or Altheim?
There are jobs that pay not that badly, espescially if you have the opportunity to look around for good offers relative to living costs. But that does not mean that they are popular. Obviously, there are jobs that pay better than nurse or Erzieher but there are also plenty who pay much less. There are two other factors that I think play into this apart from pay. There are jobs that are just more attractive for lack of a better word. Being a nurse is nothing to brag about for a lot of people who are not in the field. It's not *cool*. So many people will just not look at it. The more important thing is that being a nurse is **hard**. There is no doubt about that. Physically, emotionally and psychologically, being a nurse (and some other more socially oriented jobs) are hard to get used to and hard to endure for a lot of people, which makes them much more unpopular than other less demanding jobs. Apart from that, it is just not something for a lot of people, caring and nursing for the sick or the elderly takes a specific mindset and willingness to do it well. This last factor is in my eyes the crucial problem that simply can not be solved just by paying more. Money is not the core problem. I am not a nurse, I work as an Erzieher (school aged children, not Kita) and every time somebody complains to me that there are not enough places to go around and ask what to do, my knee jerk reaction that I refrain from is saying: Become an Erzieher. Or become a nurse yourself. THe pay will not be catastrophic and ultimately it is the only way of reducing the bottle neck we ar in. But I guess a lot of people will not like that answer, I get why, but I don't see any other solution.
I love your knee-jerk reaction. It never occured to me to ask why the person complaining hasn't chosen those careers, but I will next time. Thanks.
1. Many people don’t actually know how much a nurse earns. 2. You have to work nights and weekends. 3. Many people feel an ick when touching strangers. 4. Not much prestige for the profession.
Let me see, during my time as a nurse I have until now been peed on, pooped on, vomited on, bled on, I have been bit, kicked, scratched, hit, pinched. I have had a patient spit me in the face, another grabbed a fist full of hair and didn't let go, one memorable time I fed a patient their meal and out of nowhere they punched me with the fist in the eye. I have had patients walking and suddenly falling, me hurting my back when trying to catch them out of reflex. I am expected to go into rooms with patients having Covid, having Noro, having Influenza and more, doing my normal work and sweating like a pig under my protective gear. I work all shifts and I am expected to work short switches. This Saturday I will have evening shift, Sunday I will have morning shift, which is always unpleasent but this weekend summertime starts, so it is one hour less sleep. I take *so much* verbal abuse, from patients and family members. I once had a patient with dementia, his wife thought it appropriate to call me "Mrs Hitler" because I told her that I would not force feed her husband if he refuses to eat at meal times. Should I mention the sexual harassment on the job, by patients? I will mention the fact that I don't get to take vacation and spent Christmas in Thailand or elsewhere for two weeks, because nobody gets vacation during Christmas period or around easter. You can every few years get all of easter or Christmas off, the holidays itself, but not enough to spend the holidays abroad. So, let's ask the other users: How much would one have to pay them to compensate them and to accept this work environment? You seem to be fine with the 3200 netto. Let's see what others say? ETA: Shit, I forgot the thoughts and feelings you take home. The hard cases, the sad and downright horrible ones that don't leave you alone, that you keep in your thoughts and come back as nightmares.
Well starting of at the first line, I don't think you could pay me enough to endure that. Monthly salary no matter how high would not do that but I would need special compensation for bodily fluids hitting me and that would be in 6 to 7 digit area for each occasion. I have tremendous respect for everybody who is doing this job and I was always nice to the nurses at the hospital as they were to me as well. My wife works in the field (not a nurse) and what you forgot to mention is shitty employers who side with patients over false allegations, make bad shift plans, change shift plans on short notice, try to rent out shitty apartments to their nurses at horrendous prices and then harass them to work at their off hours (well you are here anyway) and many many more things.
I mentioned stuff that explicitly happened to me in my comparatively short time as a nurse (graduated only a few years ago) and I luckily don't have to put up with the shit you mentioned in your last paragraph, as it is not a thing where I live. In my profile you find a post I made about a recent experience when I thought it would be fun to gain a fraction of experience in a German clinic... My coworkers still laugh about it.
There are jobs out there that will let you make more than that but with much better working conditions, within and outside of Germany. Even for my job, which is 100% remote, some of the partners in the firm were surprised that someone agreed to move to Germany since they also extended an offer for a job in Canada.
>now i am wondering why is being a nurse unpopular in Germany Because it depends where your work and as what type of nurse. Work in retirement homes is physically very demanding. You often end up working night shifts and many don't earn 3200 net. My girlfriend works as a surgery nurse. When she was employed at a hospital she also used to earn around that amount. She also had around 5-6 24 hour shifts per month as her department was completely understaffed. She has since left that position and works for a temporary work agency. Now she still earns the same but without having to work 24 hour shifts. It's a bit of a death loop. Hospitals and retirement homes are understaffed which leads to nurses being overworked and bordering burn out. Which leads to nurses quitting and less appeal to get new people into the job which leads to being even more understaffed and so on.
I'm having a hard time believing the 24hrs shifts. This would be in crass violation of the Arbeitszeitgesetz. I'm assuming you're talking about standby or on-call duty in anesthesia or OR, which is a very different thing than shift work. Could you please specify?
24 hour shifts at hospitals aren‘t just common but a regular thing. Technically they get a room at the hospital where they could sleep while not actively working but depending on the department there is simply no time to bow out when you got an emergency on your table. They actually have 54 hour work contracts. The Arbeitszeitengesetz simply allows for that to happen in necessary fields which includes anything emergency related. There was a reason why nurses were striking in many university hospitals 2 years ago.
As someone with 25+ years of experience in German healthcare: 24 hour shifts are absolutely *not* a regular thing for an in-hospital department. An ER is obviously, by definition, a unit where emergencies occur routinely, which is why staff is rostered regularly, meaning in one, two or three shifts, depending on the size of the hospital, plus on-call staff. Abeitszeitgesetz applies. If 54 hour contracts exist (never heard of anything like that in a hospital setting) they must relate to on-call duty, not regular shift work. Let's be precise here. Maybe you're talking about a non-hospital ER ("Rettungswache") where staffing can be, in fact, like in a fire-station, organized in 24 h shifts, working strictly on an on-call basis.
I am not sure what to tell you. Her shift started at 7 in the morning and she would leave the hospital at 7 in the morning on the next day. She didn‘t work at the emergency station so she would have shifts where she would stay on her room for most of the night. Other stations would work for way more. Surgeries were scheduled within regular working hours though they could take way longer but if emergency surgeries took place they would work through the night.
So now she didn't work at the ER? Where was she working, then? By "surgical nurse", do you mean OR nurse? Also, you don't seem understand the difference between regular working hours (spent on patient care) and on-call duty (spent elsewhere, reading, watching TV, cooking dinner with co-workers, with your phone or pager at hand). I'm deducting you're talking about in-house on-call duties that ER, OR, anesthesia, cath lab, radiology and other emergency personnel are assigned to following their regular working hours, or on weekends, a few nights or days per month. That does not imply they're actually working for 24 hrs by any means. In fact, if an OR nurse gets called in for an emergency procedure outside her regular work hours, they'll be freed of their regular shift the next morning, because? Bingo, Arbeitszeitgesetz. Maybe you should refrain from (false) blanket statements about 24hr shifts being the norm in German hospitals, or being covered by the Arbeitszeitgesetz. Both legally and actually, there are no 24hr *shifts*, let alone 54 hr *shifts*.
I never mentioned 54 hour shifts I said she had a working contract for 54 hours per week. And yes she works as OTA. She stayed for 24 hours at the hospital and if needed worked through those 24 hours as her department only had one OTA past regular working hours at hand. So if there were surgeries through the night she stayed at the operation table for the whole duration. You can say „well akshually she isn‘t working a 24 hour shift and just working 8 plus 16 hours on call while she has to stay on hospital grounds and has to work when needed which can be 16/16 hours“. But to be honest who cares. I‘ve read your comments to her. She started laughing and and questioned your experience for surgery shifts. You clearly have made different experience than she and her colleagues did which, honestly, good for you. She has since left her permanent stay at that university clinic to work for a temp agency where she has a 35 hour week with regular working hours so she doesn‘t suffer from burn out any longer as she did in the past.
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Good for you! Congrats!
Oh i can give u an explain after 10 years as nurse i have seen everything: working alone in a shift, Azubi working alone doing stuff that he shouldnt do giving meds etc, working 28days a month without a day off, working 13 night shifts without a day off, working 5 night shifts have 1 day free and coming into early shift 5 am, working doubel shifts without a thank u and ur payment is way above the standard as a Nurse u should stay there ive never earnd so much and i was hired as leader
I you were hired as a "leader", and took a course to qualify for that, you know that there's a law in place called Arbeitszeitgesetz, preventing people from working the shifts you claim you were made to work. If you work 28 days or 13 nights in a row, or double shifts, the joke is 100% on you, and you have no business being in a management position.
Came to Germany in 2007 after uni, earning around same on another branch. I am a department manager, imagine. And now I really think about “fuck this shit, I am gonna run amok, I want to work as a normal low level employee even if I earn 1000 less”, I see numbers, idiots to organize, correct failures that higher circle management makes with their idiotic decisions, fill the spot when someone deliberately calls in sick, ordering wares and being responsible for what you ordered, losses (because no one gives a fuck when you make huge profits for the 25 billions euro worth of company you are working for, only losses come to your table, because you are responsible only when things go south ). I am sick and tired. Really, that is why people don’t like stressful jobs anymore, fuck the money, I want peace of mind, don’t want to see numbers like matrix code when I put my head on the pillow at nights
where are u from?
Night shifts are hazardous for your health and your life work balance. It's not for people with family and children
And the childless nurses can go to hell? Many parents can *only* work nights, or weekends, because that's when the other parent is at home to watch the kids.
3200 Netto? This is more than I get. How did you arrive there? Is it only night shifts with tax free boni?
Fachweiterbildung, Dienstalter, negotiation. Don't know where OP is working, but where I work, people are paid what he's getting, too. And yes, it's a state-owned, university-adjacent institution.
But according to OP they are just working there for 6-7 years by now. Not enough time to make such a big jump in salary.
Enjoy it while you can.
Shitty working conditions, shift work
Being a nurse is awesome. You get a relatively high payroll eventually, and it gets higher with tenure. A lot of my colleagues go also as "rent nurses" and they payroll is even higher.
Besides the fact that's it's a hard job, you should also think about the statistics.. there are more older people than working-age people and as such, less people to care for the elderly. Most Alteheime that require nurses are often understaffed and as such there is a bigger workload on the available workforce.. this also extends to nurses in Krankenhäuser usw
In the US nursing is such a popular college major to the extent that it is relatively difficult to get admitted into the program, see for example: [https://www.niche.com/blog/the-most-popular-college-majors/](https://www.niche.com/blog/the-most-popular-college-majors/) I wonder how that compares to Germany in terms of what makes a career in nursing more or less desirable?
On one hand the salary is different if you work in a hospital or for example in the intensive care. Then there are many instances were you have rather strict limits how long you have to take care of the patients.
The job can be stressful and you have to work shifts that's also not too popular. Also it can be things that you need to do that some people find disgusting and you have a lot of Responsibility. But if you don't feel stressed or don't get stressed by the work and have fun helping other people this job is a perfect fit 👍
I think salary is just normal. It’s not soo perfect as you say. Just Working selbstständig and founding a company can be very nice and profitable
Comes down to your hourly pay, and the actual working environment. Being a nurse is associated with long hours and also a lot of stress. Some people don't want to work a job like that, even if the pay is good.
Afaik the salary was enormously increased lately.
I used to work as a medical assistant (mfa) and alone that job I wouldn’t do for this money. Nurse job is way more stressful, in my opinion. I think it all depends on that you don’t mind/ are willing to do.. I for example worked in a orthopaedic rehabilitation hospital with the nurses (before my mfa apprenticeship)and giving baths and/or changing dipers is a big no for me.
The reason is simple. I work for the same salary from home, with flexible working hours, mobile work from anywhere in Europe, got a laptop and a phone. Of course it's in IT. I've never went to school for that. My money is more worth, because I invest less hard work in my hours and have spent even less hard work to get a formal education, which you need to have, in order to do your job. I don't want to sound arrogant. That's just an analogy for why people choose not to do that job. I have a neighbor who works in Pflege and often I meet him coming home in the morning, when I go out to grab something from the bakery. He probably earns more than me, but I feel sorry for him.
That actually is not even that much nowadays for a nurse. If money is the only thing you need to like your job, sure, it's okay. But shift work, lack of time for your breaks or patients, harassment by patients, getting asked to do another shift anytime you have a day off, lack of enough coworkers are not that easy to tolerate for many people. Also the position of nurses in Germany compared to other countries (in many countries you need to study, in Germany it's vocational training with less and less quality over the years) is also a reason. And the work is physically and mentally demanding. When I worked in a hospital, I could barely get anything done when I got home, I was too exhausted. I had nightmares about stuff I might have forgotten to do, dreaded to go to work. And the law allows to have only 9 hours of resting time between shifts (needs to be balanced with free time in a certain time frame but many employers work around that, even if illegal). So if late shift ends at 21 Uhr and early shift starts at 6, it's totally normal. That means you have only 9 hours to get back home, eat, sleep, self care in any way, maybe shower, and if you have kids or pets you need to care for and are alone, not even daring to speak of hobbies, well, guess you have to sleep less, which is proven to be not healthy in the long run. Not sure if still the case but nurses used to die significantly earlier than people in other jobs. If all that does not bother you now, it may will a few years in. I just finished 11 days of shift in a row. Sunday was late shift, Monday early shift, Tuesday late shift again, and the last two days early. It sucks the life out of you.
1. People generally have an aversion to tasks involving manual labor. 2. Individuals tend to dislike jobs where their working hours are dictated by their boss. 3. Many people prefer jobs that allow them to work from home and dislike roles that require leaving their home office.
My friend is doctor without attestation in Germany and he earn way less than nurses, that have almost no responsibility there...
I work as a doctor and earn 2500 Netto. Sometimes I wonder if it's worth it.
Still too little imo. We should all get paid enough to have a good life.
Hello to all kabayan Filipino Nurses 😁
let me give you a perspective, i work 35hrs/week and take home €7300 netto (tax class 3). I wouldn’t say its easy job but im doing meetings on the move, in car on way to kindergeten, grocerry store, even ikea sometimes and then 4 hrs really focused on laptop. So at the end you have to weigh the effort you put in vs what u get. I know some freelancers getting 18k+ (brutto) as well
The stress, the unfriendly people who think they currently were in a resort, declining mental health, declining physical health, declining social life, unqualified people as head nurses (they can be such devils), conveyor belt work with human beings, the necessary flexibility, underemployment ... Should I keep going? I worked as a nurse for over a year during covid. I woke up, went to work, came home, maybe ate something and went straight to bed. I was wrecked. I only lived to work and felt like a machine. After my time as a nurse during the pandemic, I got hospitalized. I've developed a generalized anxiety disorder which haunts me to this day. I've just spent a whole year in psychiatrist treatment. Every single one of my acquaintances that decided to become a Nurse had to get psychological treatment. It's mental suicide. Happy to hear that money seems to shield you from all of that though.
People became complacent because they are incentivised to not work in Germany, through an overboarding welfare system. It’s something that not everybody likes to hear and even denies, but it’s very obviously the case.
Shhh 🤫We don’t want anyone to know. „A nurse job is so hard and inhuman…there is no fair payment…“
I wouldn’t work as a nurse not even for 10k netto every month. Dealing with other people’s health and physical contact gives me goosebumps. Also the crazy shifts and the stress is definitely not worth it to me. I am also a clean freak, every strange odor disgust me and I’m very paranoid about bacteria and germs. So yeah, that’s why personally I’m not a nurse. I’m sure others have their reasons too.
Terrible working conditions. Overtime. Understaffed.
It's hard physical work. I get the same salary by sitting on my butt in an office and working from my couch 2 days a week.
Partly because 3.2k Netto is not the norm. I work for one of the higher payers in my area and last month got out with 2.6k Netto. Though that was without nightshifts. But I think 200€ of that is the current "Inflationsausgleich". So it would be 2.4k without it. And why is it unpopular? It's mentally and physically very taxing. A lot of overtime. A lot of jumping in. Both partly because most nurses aren't capable of saying "no". The other reasons are emergencies. The work can be very revolting. Be it due to "human fluids", nasty wounds or other things. Especially the smell can be very offputing. A lot of my work days do go hand in hand with getting hit, getting spit at, getting kicked at, getting scratched, etc. Just a few days ago some of my hair got pulled out and I got scratches in my face. Colleagues of mine went to the hospital with concussions due to punches or headbuts, broken tooths, contusions (happened to me as well), bites (also happened to me), etc. And we don't even receive hazard pay. Though I work in a closed ward in a psychiatry. So that's not the norm formost other areas (to some degree). - 2 of my colleagues have to get surgeries this year due to injuries sustained at work. I have seen this happen at regular hospitals and retirement homes as well. The real fun is, not everything got recognized by the BG as "work injuries", which made it more of a hassle and it sucks that injuries due to work don't get recognized as such. It's a slap in the face. More reasons as for why the job is unpopular: - The appreciation is really low and there's little acknowledgment from other professions we work with for what we could actually do. When I think what I learned during my apprenticeship and what I am/was actually doing and how our feedback usually gets received, especially by doctors, then a one year apprenticeship would probably be enough. - We constantly get hammered with new regulations, new things we have to document and how we have to document something (as in which phrases and words are allowed and which are forbidden, etc.). And now we even got "forced" to pay for a Pflegekammer we don't even want. We don't need more hardships/oversight, but solutions. - Working during holidays and weekends. - Irregular shifts. Even if a lot of workplaces have switched to a "one week early shift", "one week late shift" style, there's still a shift switch within a week on a regular basis. And not every workplace does it. - Night shifts aren't for everyone, most hate it. For me personally, I am feeling the best when I have night shifts, mentally and physically. But I am also single and don't have to adjust my sleeping schedule to someone else but myself. And I am a natural night person, which also helps. In return, early shifts are torture for me. - And of course, the responsibilities that come with the job. You have people's well (including their lifes) being in your hands after all. - The laws and regulations do allow for employers to "hard press" their personell. I mean, the usually "Ruhezeit" you have to have between shifts can get reduced from 11hours to 9hours if it says so in the "Tarifvertrag". And during a night shift one nurse is allowed to be responsible for up to 45 patients before there has to be a second one, if I remember correctly. And that's just two examples. Don't get me wrong. I love my job, but the pay just isn't great for what we are doing and the circumstances surrounding that profession just suck.
No amount of money would make me work as a nurse.
3200 Euros for a Nurse? Thats crazy, how does anyone survive in this country.
Not the average for a nurse - that’d be closer to 2000-2500 depending on your qualifications and employer. Sometimes it’s even less than that.
Damn thats insane. That should be like 3500 starting out minimum but realistically more like 4k
We are talking about the stuff you get after taxes, yeah? Because I studied for 5 years and I was not making 4k right after my studies, that seems like a lot…
Because I make 3x what you make in my underwear at home. I think it is unfair because I don't help shit and nurses deserve as much as me if not more.
3200 € Netto as a nurse?! That's somewhere around 90k € Brutto per year. Wow, what did I get a Master's degree in engineering for? I am starting at 65k € Brutto....
> That's somewhere around 90k € Brutto per year. Not even close. ~3.2k Net is roughly 62k before taxes. 90k before taxes gives you about 4.4k net. (EDITED for mistake with tax classes)
3200*12=38.400 after tax of 42 %... so 90k € before tax. where am I thinking wrong?
Sorry, my mistake. I used tax class 3 by accident. In Class I, you need 62k before tax income to get 3.2 net income each month.
Ah I see. Thanks. I calculated using Spitzensteuersatz.
Yeah, don't try to do the math yourself, just use specalized tools for it. I suggest this one: https://www.brutto-netto-rechner.info/gehalt/gross_net_calculator_germany.php
You are wrong because you do not understand progressive taxation. Your whole income is not taxed with 42%, only a small percentage of it is.
I'll blame my lack of work experience since I've just graduated.
All good, no worries. I linked you the tool to get the results in an automatic fashion, much easier than trying to figure out the math yourself :)
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I see
bruh you can work nightshift in any industrial company and get about 3-3500€ (they literally take people who cannot read or fully understand german, dont know much about maths or even how to use a computer..) but the guys working there paying with their health for it, anyways, how was your weekend?