The highest-paying hospitals for nurses are in California. At the top hospitals, new grads can earn $130K+ a year in base pay, and senior per diem nurses can earn past $300K with shift pay. We pulled the union contracts to show it. Here is our 2025 update.
These rates are from October 2025, when this was first written. Pay changes every year, so check current rates in Map My Pay.
Why most nurses don’t know where their money goes
You pick up extra shifts. You skip lunch. You say yes when the charge nurse asks you to stay late. When your paycheck hits, it still feels like there’s a hole in the bucket.
You’re not imagining it. Most nurses have no idea what is eating their income. Hospitals and payroll don’t show you the full breakdown of taxes, what comes out and what you take home.
That’s one of the main reasons Monica and I built these spreadsheets in the first place.
Why we built this spreadsheet
When we first compared pay at California hospitals, we saw that nurses were flying blind. Hospitals post “average” pay. Job sites give made-up numbers. You end up guessing if a job is worth it.
So we started pulling union contracts one by one. We logged the exact pay scale for each hospital, from base day shift all the way to per diem nights. Through YouTube, I was able to collect dozens of these contracts. They have data you can’t easily find on Google.
For 2025, we updated it again, and this is our biggest version yet.
New hospitals added for 2025
This update adds three big hospitals nurses have asked about:
- Good Samaritan Hospital
- John Muir Health
- El Camino Hospital (updated 2025 pay scale)
These join over 60 hospitals already in our California database. You can sort all of them by years on the job, shift and job type, like staff or per diem.
How high new grad base pay goes
Here is what base pay for new grads looks like in 2025. This is 0 years on the job, day shift, with no extra shift pay.
This is before any extra pay for evenings, nights, weekends or per diem. That means the top hospitals can hit $130K+ a year in base pay for new grads. Senior per diem nurses can climb past $300K with shift pay. For more on new grad pay, read what California pays new grad nurses.
How this compares to our 2023 numbers
We first shared this list in December 2023. Here were the top numbers back then. The Stanford new grad rate was at Stanford Medical Center.
| Example (2023 rates) | Pay |
|---|---|
| Stanford new grad, days, base per hour | $86/hr |
| Stanford new grad, days, 36 hrs/week, per year | $160,561 |
| Kaiser NorCal new grad, days, 36 hrs/week, per year | $144,444 |
| Per diem, nights, 30 years, 40 hrs/week, per year | $346,943 |
That $346,943 was the most you could earn without overtime back then. A per diem nurse is not sure to get 40 hours a week. But in some places, like some Kaiser units, a per diem nurse may be able to average 40 hours a week. You can dig into these two systems with our free Stanford pay spreadsheet and free Kaiser pay spreadsheet.
The Tax Sheet shows what you keep
Most nurses don’t know how much taxes and other cuts shrink their take-home pay. That’s why we built the Tax Sheet. It’s a tab in the spreadsheet that does what your hospital payroll doesn’t. It shows you what comes out of your paycheck.
You can enter your:
- Filing status (single, married and so on)
- 401K amounts
- Health, dental and vision premiums
- FSA and HSA amounts
- Federal, state, Social Security, Medicare and SDI rates
It then works out your net income after taxes, down to the dollar.
So instead of guessing what a “$180K job” pays, you see your monthly take-home and your tax split. You also see how much you keep if you raise your 401K or change how you file. You can switch between monthly and biweekly pay too.
This is how nurses in our program plan their year. They know what they keep, not just what the offer says. To see take-home pay at the top hospitals, read net pay by top-paying California hospital.
The Oregon update
We also released the Top Oregon Hospital Salaries Spreadsheet. Here is a preview of what’s inside.
Oregon may not match California’s top pay. But lower costs and different taxes can flip the math. That’s why we added an Oregon Tax Sheet. It covers:
- Oregon’s flat 9% income tax
- No state disability tax, unlike California
- Lower payroll taxes
With one click, you see your net pay in Oregon vs California and how much more freedom your money buys.
Why this matters
When Monica and I first started tracking our income, we saw that we didn’t need to work more hours. We needed to work smarter. That meant knowing how much we kept after taxes, housing and benefits.
That changed everything for us. The same tools now help other nurses plan moves, pay off debt and stop living paycheck to paycheck.
Your next move
See what you’d take home, then make the move
Map My Pay shows what nurses take home after taxes and rent at 465+ hospitals and in 21,000+ cities. It’s the app I co-founded so you can compare cities before you pack a single box.
The Nurses to Riches Accelerator is the plan Monica and I used to go from $37 an hour in New York to $143 an hour in California: license, city, hospital, and what to do with the money after.
Get the Map My Pay app
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Every Accelerator plan is a one-time payment with a 30-day money-back guarantee.
Written by Jason, RN. I went from $37 an hour in New York to $143 an hour in California and paid off $128K of debt in under a year. I share our numbers in the Nurses to Riches newsletter and on YouTube.