RN Salaries vs LPN Salaries

Of those 3,200,000 nurses, the majority (2,500,000) are Registered Nurses, which includes everything from hospital staff nurses that just got their degree, to Advanced Practice Nurses with specialized certifications and training. Licensed Practical Nurses, the other 700,000 of all nurses, have less variation in certifications. You can read our post on LPN Average Salaries.

The variety of factors for Registered Nurses makes any “average RN salary” a dubious number, though the Bureau of Labor Statistics puts it at $62,450. According to Salary.com, 50% of all RN Staff Nurses salaries fall between $55,834 to $67,766. But what determines where in that range your salary should be? What determines how high your salary can go? Let’s take a look at three things: experience, school, and location.

Registered Nurses Salaries & Experience

One of the obvious factors that determines an RN’s salary is amount of experience. From the data PayScale has gathered, it looks like there are two stages of experience that make big differences (from starting salaries) in average salaries. What we don’t know from PayScale’s data is whether experience is really the driving factor, or something related that could be accomplished sooner, like level of responsibility or advanced certifications.

RN Schools, and Salary Surprises

Every nursing school promises its graduates a great job, but which ones really deliver? Universities don’t yet collect much data beyond, in some cases, starting salary offers given to their graduates. Surveys done by PayScale had 4,600 nurses name their schools, collecting enough data to show salary ranges for 7 schools; among them, two of the best performing were the University of Phoenix, and Excelsior College… schools best known for being online universities.

UPX and Excelsior outperformed traditional colleges like Louisiana State and the University of South Carolina. Which isn’t to say traditional college programs can’t also result in high salaries: New York University performs just as well as UPX, and the University of Maryland even better than Excelsior. But two things are clear:

1. Education makes a difference, and nurses have many options to make it a good one.
2. There are too many nursing schools that don’t know how their graduates are doing.

Nurse Salaries by State

Location can be one of the most important factors in determining a nurse’s salary. But it’s also one of the most complicated. There aren’t easy correlations between a state’s size and nursing salaries, for instance. Maryland has an average salary of $74,370, near the same as New York’s average salary of $73,160, despite New York having 3x as many nursing jobs, and 4x as much population.

And how much of salary differences are actually a result of nurses being more likely to come from certain schools in certain states, or more likely to work for employers of a certain size? (Not many mega-hospitals in South Dakota, ranked 47th in pay & 46th in population.) Find out what’s really affecting your salary, and what makes the difference in those who are paid more: take the CareerNumbers Nurse Salary Survey.

The average LPN makes around $39,000 a year. But the range can be quite wide. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), 80% of LPNs make anywhere from $28,260 to $53,580. With that wide of a range, how can you know how much you should be making? While the salary information that is currently available on the internet is limited, it is good enough to see a couple of clear trends.

Hospital LPNs Pay: More than Doctor’s Office, Less Than Home Care

Hospital LPNs account for 22% of the 730,000+ Licensed Practical Nurses. But they’re paid $2,000 / year less, on average, than LPNs working in Nursing Care Facilities or in Home Health Care Services. And LPNs working in Doctor’s Offices are paid $4,500 less than Hospital LPNs. Together, these four types of employers account for 71% of all LPN jobs.

Experienced LPNs Make More

According to PayScale, LPNs with 5-9 years of experience make between $30,489 to $44,603 per year, while LPNs with less than 1 year of experience make between $26,276 to $39,986 per year.

What Makes the Difference?

Clearly, even within different experience brackets, there’s plenty of variety in salaries. So what might make the difference between what you’re making now and $3,000 more each year? CareerNumbers can help you find out, for free. We’re conducting an ongoing nursing salary survey, that will help participants understand their market value, which factors most impact it (i.e., location, work-setting, specialization, union status, etc.), and what you can do to earn more (for example, you may be surprised how much certifications can improve your market value).

Join other LPNs who want to improve their careers, and take the CareerNumbers Nurse Salary Survey:

#1 - @NursingCenter

@NursingCenter is the single best Continuing Education resource on twitter. Run by Lisa Bonsall, the Clinical Editor at NursingCenter.com, @NursingCenter is a good mix of conversation & information.

#2 - @AmJNurse (American Journal of Nursing)

The official twitter account of the American Journal of Nursing, @AmJNurs tweets on the life, work, and politics of nursing.

#3 - @AbbieCitron

Working as a Legal Nurse Consultant, Abbie is a prolific conversationalist, and an excellent filter of good links and great tweets from the huge collection of medical tweeps out there.

#4 - The Ladies of NursesPTO

Bloggers for the ever-growing NursesPTO, these Texas girls know how to have a good time (making it a better time for those of us that follow them).

• @lipodoc, Rachael Keilin, is a liposection surgeon of uncensored wit & wisdom.
• @nursewendy, Wendy Kelton, keeps things relatable with tweets about her work, lots of conversation, and an occasional interesting link.
• @nursejennifer, Jennifer Smith, completes the team with frank, fun, and frequent tweets.

#5 - @AmerNurse2day (American Nurse Today)

American Nurse Today is the official journal of the American Nurses Association. Its twitter account is an excellent resource, a continuous stream of medical discoveries & treatment tips.

#6 - @allnurses

On of the biggest nursing community sites online, AllNurses.com provided tweets about all news with nurses involved, and links to the most interesting of its community discussions.

#7 - @FutureOfNursing

This is the twitter account of the Future of Nursing Initiative, which works to find nursing-based solutions for improving patient care. They’re a great follow for skill improvement, and are at the forefront of making life better for nurses and those under their care.

Bonus: @NursesPro

Not above shamelessly plugging ourselves, we’re all about helping nurses make the most of their careers. We tweet about career improvement, nurse networking, and getting better pay and satisfaction from nursing jobs. We run the CareerNumbers Nurse Salary Survey.

Hope we’ve helped you find some great additions to your twitter stream! Follow us for more recommendations, and career improvement tweets.