Sharp HealthCare announced Friday that its registered nurses have ratified a new contract that will increase overall pay by 18% over four years, a deal that arrived after union members staged a three-day strike in late November. The Sharp Professional Nurses Network, affiliated with United Nurses As sociations of California/Union of Health Care Professionals, represents an estimated 5,700 members. The union confirmed the contract ratification Friday afternoon, saying in its own statement that its members also will receive 72 hours of “frontloaded” sick leave and “a restoration of retiree medical benefits,” as part of the deal. Sharp’s statement indicates that base pay will increase 5% across the board in the contract’s first year, with 4% bumps for each of the agreement’s final three years. While those percentages add up to a total of 17 percentage points, a union spokesperson confirmed Friday afternoon that the overall increase totals 18% when annual compounding is accounted for. The union also represents Kaiser nurses who are planning to stage their own strike of unlimited duration starting Monday. The two sides of this negotiation, which have been in negotiations since September 2025, have included union claims that Kaiser has put “profits over patients” in its negotiations. The report claims that Kaiser has $66 billion in “unrestricted reserves,” suggesting that the health care giant can afford larger wage increases for workers. Kaiser effectively threw up its hands Thursday, indicating that it will pursue abandoning a nationwide negotiation strategy involving 53 different bargaining units across the states it serves. Instead, Kaiser said, it will move negotiations to local bargaining units. Kaiser says it has offered union alliance-represented nurses “across-the-board wage increases totaling 21.5% over the 4 years of the contract.” ...read more read less