By 2020, the U.S. government predicts that America’s nursing shortage will be between 800,000 and one million nurses.

By 2020, the U.S. government predicts that it will be short between 800,000 and one million nurses. (Close to 117,000 short in California alone.)

Before that – 2015 – the U.S. Department of Health projects that 400,000 new nurses will be needed just to fill vacancies left by retirees.

The problems

While lucrative incentives are being offered for Americans to enter nursing college and for existing nurses to go back to school to become nursing college faculty, a longer-living, less-healthy population is already starting to weigh on the American healthcare system.

The up-side

Already strained by an out-of-control deficit of trained nurses, stressful shifts for the nurses who are holding down the fort, and – unbeknownst to many – a shortage of teachers to open-up class sizes at nursing colleges, the deal has never been sweeter for anyone with the smarts to make the grade.

The trouble spots

Not surprisingly, Alaska has the largest nursing shortfall as a percentage of nursing positions left vacant: Beautiful as the endless summers and Northern Lights of the winter are, not every nurse wants to make the trek up to the 49th state: Only 58 percent of nursing positions there are currently filled…And a paltry 40 per cent are expected to be filled in 2015.

More surprisingly, Hawaii is also facing one of the nation’s highest vacancy rates for nursing positions. So too is Connecticut.

Overall, California is short the largest number of overall nurses: nearly 48,000 right now, a projected 81,000 in 2015 and as many as 116,600 by 2020.

Not far behind those numbers are Florida and – to a lesser extent – Georgia and New Jersey.

Flaws in the data

What’s even more troubling is that state-level data on the nursing shortage isn’t even accurate all the time: Vermont used government-gathered data to plan ahead, thought they had all the nurses they needed, and ended up with a sizable shortage (PDF).

The numbers are daunting; For example, in order to meet the projected future health care needs of the state, New Jersey needs to triple the annual number of nursing school graduates from 2000 per year to 6,000 per year.

What are the solutions?

Government studies have proposed everything from asking existing nurses to delay retirement for up to four years, increasing the number of nursing college teaching staff, and inviting more nurses from other countries to fill vacant jobs.

Projected FTE RN Supply under Alternative Wage Growth Scenarios

But perhaps most interesting option for anyone considering a career in nursing is a government study that explores the notion of raising nursing salaries nationwide an additional 1-3 per cent. Such a move would theoretically increase the number of people graduating from nursing college, though still not quite enough to meet demand.

A silver lining, if you’re interested…

Thanks to upcoming recruitment and retention programs as well as a number of educational incentives, becoming a nurse in America over the next few years will likely be cheaper than is has been in a while, and working as a nurse will likely be more lucrative than its ever been.

If undecided college-bound teens are up for it, they may just find the recession-proof jobs they’ve been looking for.

(Interested in seeing what states have the highest demand? Take a look at the projected numbers below…)

State-by-state numbers:

RN supply and demand, 2010 and 2015

(Yellow highlighting denotes largest supply gaps by %

Green highlighting denotes largest overall supply gaps by number)

State 2010 2015 Supply Demand Supply – Demand Supply ÷ Demand Supply Demand Supply – Demand Supply ÷

Demand AK 3,200 5,500 -2,300 58% 2,500 6,100 -3,600 41% AL 36,600 36,800 -200 99% 38,200 40,300 -2,100 95% AR 19,300 22,000 -2,700 88% 19,800 24,300 -4,500 81% AZ 30,700 43,200 -12,500 71% 30,500 48,500 -18,000 63% CA 153,300 200,900 -47,600 76% 148,200 228,900 -80,700 65% CO 27,200 38,100 -10,900 71% 25,100 42,500 -17,400 59% CT 22,900 34,000 -11,100 67% 19,900 36,600 -16,700 54% DC 6,500 9,500 -3,000 68% 5,900 10,200 -4,300 58% DE 6,300 7,600 -1,300 83% 6,100 8,100 -2,000 75% FL 112,000 144,700 -32,700 77% 110,200 164,300 -54,100 67% GA 48,200 64,600 -16,400 75% 45,300 71,600 -26,300 63% HI 7,900 12,400 -4,500 64% 8,100 13,900 -5,800 58% IA 26,600 30,000 -3,400 89% 26,000 31,800 -5,800 82% ID 7,400 8,200 -800 90% 7,300 9,200 -1,900 79% IL 85,600 94,900 -9,300 90% 81,900 101,300 -19,400 81% IN 41,600 49,800 -8,200 84% 40,400 53,500 -13,100 76% KS 22,100 23,100 -1,000 96% 21,800 24,900 -3,100 88% KY 34,700 33,500 1,200 104% 35,500 36,300 -800 98% LA 37,200 37,100 100 100% 39,100 40,600 -1,500 96% MA 60,100 76,200 -16,100 79% 56,000 81,700 -25,700 69% MD 35,600 42,600 -7,000 84% 33,800 46,100 -12,300 73% ME 11,600 14,100 -2,500 82% 11,100 15,300 -4,200 73% MI 72,000 75,100 -3,100 96% 68,900 79,600 -10,700 87% MN 41,800 46,200 -4,400 90% 41,200 50,400 -9,200 82% MO 45,700 58,600 -12,900 78% 44,200 63,100 -18,900 70% MS 22,600 23,100 -500 98% 23,600 25,400 -1,800 93% MT 6,500 7,000 -500 93% 6,300 7,800 -1,500 81% NC 67,400 75,500 -8,100 89% 68,600 83,700 -15,100 82% ND 5,800 6,700 -900 87% 5,800 7,300 -1,500 79% NE 14,700 17,100 -2,400 86% 14,900 18,500 -3,600 81% NH 9,300 12,600 -3,300 74% 8,800 13,800 -5,000 64% NJ 55,000 74,600 -19,600 74% 50,500 80,400 -29,900 63% NM 11,000 14,100 -3,100 78% 11,300 15,900 -4,600 71% NV 9,200 13,300 -4,100 69% 8,700 14,700 -6,000 59% NY 142,300 163,800 -21,500 87% 137,400 174,000 -36,600 79% OH 88,900 101,000 -12,100 88% 85,500 107,300 -21,800 80% OK 21,500 22,000 -500 98% 22,100 24,300 -2,200 91% OR 22,400 27,700 -5,300 81% 21,100 31,100 -10,000 68% PA 99,200 120,300 -21,100 82% 90,600 127,200 -36,600 71% RI 9,000 12,000 -3,000 75% 8,400 12,800 -4,400 66% SC 25,900 31,100 -5,200 83% 26,200 34,400 -8,200 76% SD 7,900 8,100 -200 98% 7,900 8,700 -800 91% TN 42,800 61,300 -18,500 70% 41,800 67,800 -26,000 62% TX 118,700 160,600 -41,900 74% 119,000 179,900 -60,900 66% UT 14,100 15,600 -1,500 90% 14,900 17,500 -2,600 85% VA 47,600 58,600 -11,000 81% 46,300 64,300 -18,000 72% VT 4,800 5,400 -600 89% 4,400 5,800 -1,400 76% WA 37,300 46,100 -8,800 81% 35,100 52,100 -17,000 67% WI 43,300 42,800 500 101% 42,200 46,300 -4,100 91% WV 14,600 13,900 700 105% 14,600 14,700 -100 99% WY 3,300 4,500 -1,200 73% 3,300 5,100 -1,800 65% U.S.a 1,941,200 2,347,000 -405,800 83% 1,886,100 2,569,800 -683,700 73%

a Due to rounding, national totals might fail to equal the sum across states.