Amid nurse shortage, a university rolls out the welcome mat for men • Hacker News Board

Re: Amid nurse shortage, a university rolls out the welcome mat for men

#81

Post by testerteert000a » Tue, Jul 21, 2026, 9:27 PM UTC

orwin wrote: post #68

testerteert000a wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After decades of clicking on different spots on screens and keyboards, the real stress in exchange for that, and now your peers in AI companies have found a way to unemploy you - there's a lot to like with hands on care that does something tangible that tech rarely does.

People you tend to for months or years dying on you gets old really fast though. In my family, the 5 doctors are still working (or kept working until retirement), of the 8 PT, only one isn't working as a PT, but of the 4 nurses only one is still working (she's getting a psych speciality), the other all went another way. Granted, we're not in the US where the nurses are paid more, but the reason to stop wasn't the pay…

Agreed, it's a hard job.

I think what is most relevant to me these days:

- When I explain to my family, peers, and the endstate about what I did with my time during working years, I'd like to be able to answer it in a certain way. I stopped being able to answer it in that way by staying in tech, I realized.

- Things over the "months to years" cycle look bad-bad. Shorthand described as I lived through 2008, AI on a timeline looks a heck of a lot like that, and I'd take a morale toll if that's the only toll I end up paying from 2026-2035.

Re: Amid nurse shortage, a university rolls out the welcome mat for men

#82

Post by yoyohello13 » Tue, Jul 21, 2026, 9:28 PM UTC

nekusar wrote: post #80

yoyohello13 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure why you said 'Not at all'. Your comment seems to corroborate exactly what I said. People who don't care are specifically rewarded more than people who do and it's by design.

Its not at all wild. The capitalists set the system up. Capitalism exploits by its nature. So finding people who are more easily exploitable makes a great deal of capitalist sense. That's how and why this shit was set up.

Ah, ok I see. Your correcting the fact that I think it's wild when it actually shouldn't be surprising. I understand now.

Re: Amid nurse shortage, a university rolls out the welcome mat for men

#83

Post by Teever » Tue, Jul 21, 2026, 9:33 PM UTC

bluefirebrand wrote: post #69

Teever wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These kinds of programs have existed for decades. You've been wondering about that not because these programs weren't there but because you weren't looking for them. There are a lot of good reasons why we want more men in nursing. For personal reasons some patients may respond better to interactions with men. Additionally men being on average larger and stronger then women is an advantage in a society with many overw…

> You've been wondering about that not because these programs weren't there but because you weren't looking for them I wasn't looking for grants as a woman in compsci either, but I sure heard about those > There are a lot of good reasons why we want more men in nursing. I never disputed or questioned that

I worked at a hospital delivering food and I also went to school for CS and I heard about both opportunities to draw men to nursing and women to compsci.

The reason that you didn’t hear about them was that you weren’t looking in that area.

Re: Amid nurse shortage, a university rolls out the welcome mat for men

#84

Post by Balgair » Tue, Jul 21, 2026, 9:34 PM UTC

engeljohnb wrote: post #46

I'm a male healthcare worker (cardiac sonographer), and even though there are a lot more women, there were never any barriers for me because of my gender. If there's a shortage, it's because employers need to pay more, same as every other labor "shortage." Nursing is in demand everywhere, and not everyone has what it takes to do their work. If they could be making more money somewhere else, that's where they'll go. A…

You know what? I'm glad that nurses and healthcare workers are finally not thinking of the patients first and are thinking of their pocketbooks too.

No, really, I mean it.

For decades, the healthcare complex has been exploiting these workers to our detriment.

The supply of workers is really high, typically, as there is this nobility to the professions. You are a 'helper', you are 'doing something with your life', you have a 'calling'. That extra feel-feels accounted for a lot of extra people in the workforce and that depressed wages as it increased supply. The actual work itself suffered too, as we all had to deal with burnt out healthcare workers with too many bills and not enough dollars. Even a pandemic barely hurt he business model (as far as I can tell from a quick googling).

But if workers start caring about the money more, then the wages will rise (hopefully), and that will attract better workers and not ones near the near of their ropes financially. We all will be better off. I think this goes for teachers too.

Re: Amid nurse shortage, a university rolls out the welcome mat for men

#85

Post by tracker1 » Tue, Jul 21, 2026, 10:15 PM UTC

bbradley406 wrote: post #76

tracker1 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's also plumbing, a/c and electrical work... general repairman stuff, etc. Assuming you're okay working hands on and potentially in more stressful environments (weather). I'm largely with Mike Rowe on this one... it's been a shame the level that people have not been directed into more vocational fields and the level of skilled labor shortages as a result. Higher education has largely been self-serving, not commu…

Unless there is an actual effort to pay people well for this work, the shortage is a myth and you are spreading a false belief. Mike Rowe is the last person you should be listening to about hard work and trade jobs. He's correct about people getting pushed into college, but he is wrong for trying to make trade work glamorous and manly on TV. I'm in a skilled trade and see lots of dudes getting their bodies shredded (…

Then become a bartender if that's what you want. I know several plumbers, electricians, welders, etc. that make six figures.

Re: Amid nurse shortage, a university rolls out the welcome mat for men

#86

Post by bbradley406 » Tue, Jul 21, 2026, 10:50 PM UTC

tracker1 wrote: post #85

bbradley406 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless there is an actual effort to pay people well for this work, the shortage is a myth and you are spreading a false belief. Mike Rowe is the last person you should be listening to about hard work and trade jobs. He's correct about people getting pushed into college, but he is wrong for trying to make trade work glamorous and manly on TV. I'm in a skilled trade and see lots of dudes getting their bodies shredded (…

Then become a bartender if that's what you want. I know several plumbers, electricians, welders, etc. that make six figures.

It's not what I want. I like my trade and with a few more years, some effort and luck I'll be getting there to six as well.

My point is that for every 1 successful electrician and 1 plumber on a job, there's a handful of guys at the concrete plant. There's 3-5 guys on the roof laying shingle and getting cooked in the sun. There's usually a team of 3-5 guys hanging sheet-rock. A lot of trade work absolutely does suck for the money that's offered. In some situations the money is really good, but the work is even more extreme (oil rigs, heli work, crane ops, etc)

If the plan is "be smart, learn, get skilled and successful" and it works, I am sincerely happy for those guys. I know more of the guys it didn't work for though, there's a lot of them.

Re: Amid nurse shortage, a university rolls out the welcome mat for men

#87

Post by bluefirebrand » Tue, Jul 21, 2026, 11:55 PM UTC

Teever wrote: post #83

bluefirebrand wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You've been wondering about that not because these programs weren't there but because you weren't looking for them I wasn't looking for grants as a woman in compsci either, but I sure heard about those > There are a lot of good reasons why we want more men in nursing. I never disputed or questioned that

I worked at a hospital delivering food and I also went to school for CS and I heard about both opportunities to draw men to nursing and women to compsci. The reason that you didn’t hear about them was that you weren’t looking in that area.

> The reason that you didn’t hear about them was that you weren’t looking in that area

The purpose of advertising is to reach people who aren't looking at a specific area.

Re: Amid nurse shortage, a university rolls out the welcome mat for men

#88

Post by seanmcdirmid » Wed, Jul 22, 2026, 12:01 AM UTC

engeljohnb wrote: post #46

I'm a male healthcare worker (cardiac sonographer), and even though there are a lot more women, there were never any barriers for me because of my gender. If there's a shortage, it's because employers need to pay more, same as every other labor "shortage." Nursing is in demand everywhere, and not everyone has what it takes to do their work. If they could be making more money somewhere else, that's where they'll go. A…

I don’t understand how healthcare can get even more expensive without the system just utterly collapsing. That being said, we could definitely justify higher salaries with greater productivity (via automation), but the market tends to reward the capitalists for that instead of the workers. We really have to figure that out soon.

Re: Amid nurse shortage, a university rolls out the welcome mat for men

#89

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Jul 22, 2026, 2:02 AM UTC

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #88

engeljohnb wrote: post #46

I'm a male healthcare worker (cardiac sonographer), and even though there are a lot more women, there were never any barriers for me because of my gender. If there's a shortage, it's because employers need to pay more, same as every other labor "shortage." Nursing is in demand everywhere, and not everyone has what it takes to do their work. If they could be making more money somewhere else, that's where they'll go. A…

I don’t understand how healthcare can get even more expensive without the system just utterly collapsing. That being said, we could definitely justify higher salaries with greater productivity (via automation), but the market tends to reward the capitalists for that instead of the workers. We really have to figure that out soon.

[deleted]

Re: Amid nurse shortage, a university rolls out the welcome mat for men

#90

Post by pseudohadamard » Wed, Jul 22, 2026, 8:34 AM UTC

engeljohnb wrote: post #46

I'm a male healthcare worker (cardiac sonographer), and even though there are a lot more women, there were never any barriers for me because of my gender. If there's a shortage, it's because employers need to pay more, same as every other labor "shortage." Nursing is in demand everywhere, and not everyone has what it takes to do their work. If they could be making more money somewhere else, that's where they'll go. A…

I think it's also a perception thing. In the last 10-20 years or so it's changed quite a bit, when I was younger you had "nurses" and "male nurses". Nurses were automatically female, so any who weren't were explicitly tagged as such because it was such an exceptional thing.

It's sort of like IT and engineering, that was exclusively male at one point. Not because women were excluded but because computers were things for geeks and dorks and completely uncool to be associated with.

(Technically that's not 100% true, we did have one female student on display in a glass case at the entrance to the School of Engineering).