One of the most unrecognized low-wage jobs is that of an Emergency Medical Technician. The mean hourly wage for EMTs as of May 2009 was $15.88, not nearly enough for a family to comfortably live off of [6]. Many people tend to assume that EMTs are paid very well based off the assumption that because doctors receive such high pay, all workers in the medical field are paid just as well. In fact, this is just the opposite. Once someone decides to become an EMT, they are committing to hours of training, increased stress, emotional challenges, and often very strenuous physical situations [7]. So why would anyone consciously choose to put themselves through this difficulty if it does not provide adequate payment? In addition to one’s potential interest in medicine, one of the main factors driving EMT recruitment is one’s need for personal fulfillment [3]. From both personal experience as well as other’s accounts, possessing the ability to help people medically and heal is yet another major aspect of why EMTs accept the low wage lifestyle for the profession they are in.

One aspect of concern in the EMS world is that of EMT retention rates. Because wages are so low in comparison to the amount of work, time, effort, and effects of the job, many EMTs leave the field much sooner than they had planned. It has been argued that among the most prominent reasons for leaving the EMS field are those of low recognition, low pay, lack of benefits and awards, and the lack of feeling appreciated for the work they perform [5]. Numerous ways of counteracting and reversing this decreasing retention rate have been proposed [2, 5]. It is now up to the individual EMS providers to implement these ways of changing the retention rate in order to ensure that enough EMTs are employed to care for communities [1].

In my research hypertext, I will explore why Emergency Medical Technicians choose to become EMTs, knowing that they will receive wages that are not proportional to the immense amount of work they perform, as well as the reasons for such low retention rates.