The United States has been recognizing unions as a legal entity for many years now and most major unions are a part of the public sector such as teachers, doctors, and police. Collective bargaining in the case of wages and salaries, fringe benefits, and other working environments for all these sectors are concluded by labor unions. Even though the number of unions has excessively decreased in the last 40-50 years, however, they still tend to be an important element in a countryâs politics (Stearley, 1996). Labor unions also claim to be more actively working in the nursing sector. Their contributions are subjected to providing an excellent working environment and a more relaxed frame of mind to the registered nurses all across the United States.
ANA â American Nursing Association
ANA has been the voice of American nurses for more than a century now. Their major contributions include the development of policies, lobbying nurses, major newsletter and other published material, internet portability for nurses, and partnerships with other important organizations. The needs of all nurses are addressed formally and quickly thus ensuring proper flow of information. Alignment of proper policies ensures the equitable position of the nurse in all healthcare settings. The American Nurses Association (ANA) is one of the only professional bodies for nurses which embody over 3.1 million indexed nurses through its elemental nursing associations which are affiliated with the Center for American Nurses (Stearley, 1996). This union takes the nursing profession ahead by maintaining high standards of practice, fighting and captivating the rights of nurses in the workplace, keeping their image realistic, and regulating fair practices in order to favorably affect nurses and the public.
SEIU 1199 NW
The Service Employees International Union is among many reputed unions affiliated with Washington University. SEIU 1199NW is a representative for many nurses at the Harborview Medical Center of Seattle. Among many other entities, they also represent nurses in state hospitals and state clinics. In this outgrowing industry with fees and other expenses rising continuously, the union ensures that the lower class nurses are given at least their wages and promised benefits. SEIU has been operating for more than 75 years and through its efforts to empower the operational class, SEIU has been victorious. Member database is continuously growing and the classes and sectors of work that the union represents are also on the rise. SEIU is the fascinating hold of the worker’s aspiration for fairness and helping to make that fairness realism (Colasurdo).
The Washington State Nurses Association
The Washington State Nurses Association (WSNA) is an expertsâ union that is continuously serving to defend and hold up nurses and the nursing occupation. All nurses from different parts of the Washington State ally to formulate this union about near a century ago. The WSNA’s main reason is to help out in the nursesâ training standards and accomplish today the acts to sustain nurses (Stearley, 1996). The union works with a vision of being the support, power, and advocacy for the nurses in Washington State.
Labor Unions and their effectiveness in the development of United States
The needs of all registered nurses are served sufficiently by a professional organization. Finally, the occupation of nursing, like other servers who provide a critical tune-up to the community, is often in the contradiction between prospects of unselfishness and a wish for individual safety. According to Huston (2005) a mature workforce, which increased work of nurses in patients out of the hospital or those who are attended in the ambulance are high yielding but the workers tend to be dissatisfied because of the shortage of long-term wages and benefits and a rising credit by nurses that they can often make more cash and act more separately as liberated agents as compared to full-time nurses and doctors. However, with the passage of time, nurses today are finding that their specialized goals do not, in fact, run in contradiction with their situation as service employees; better operational conditions often give a better point of patient concerns. This is leading to unity among the healthcare professionals and is being valued increasingly thus making America more United (p. 207-225).
References
Colasurdo, Peter. SEIU 1199 NW. 2002. Web.
Huston, C. (2005). Professional issues in nursing: Challenges and opportunities p.207-225. Philadelphia: Lippincott, Williams & Willkins.
Stearley, H. (1996). The Rise and Fall of Nursing Unions . Web.