© Dan Kosmayer/Shutterstock.
The proportion of male registered nurses jumped from 2.7% in 1970 to 9.6% in 2011, according to data from the 2011 American Community Survey. The number of men who are licensed practical and licensed vocational nurses also rose from 3.9% in 1970 to 8.1% in 2011. (Licensed practical nurses work under the direction of doctors and registered nurses.)
"A predicted shortage has led to recruiting and retraining efforts to increase the pool of nurses," report author Liana Christin Landivar, a sociologist in the Census Bureau's Industry and Occupation Statistics Branch, said in a statement. "These efforts have included recruiting men into nursing."
Women still made up 91% of the nursing workforce, but men, on average, earned $60,700 a year in 2011, compared with $51,100 a year for women. The gender wage gap is such a myth though, right?
[USA Today]
The guys are making more because they probably go for more hours and settings which may have extra certifications. Lots of female nurses don't work full time because of children. What a nurse gets paid is not often arbitrary, but defined by the institution on a fairly rigid basis based mostly on years worked.