For more information, go to the Wage and Salary Survey, done by ASCP.

http://www.ascp.org

Click on Board of Registry right under the ASCP

Click on Medical Lab Careers in left column

Click on Wage & Vacancy Survey 1998 in upper right square

Click on the Hourly Median line

(They don't make it easy to find, do they?)

Anyway, you can find out median wages of hospitals, various size
hospitals, private labs, different regions in the US.

In general:

	Begin	Top	Average

HT	10.90	15.50	13.50
MLT	10.40	14.90	12.90

HTL	12.00	17.70	15.60
MT	13.00	18.50	16.00

In general,  HT's seem to be paid about 50-60 cents more an hour than
MLT.
In general, HTL's seem to be paid about 40-100 cents less an hour than
MT.

My opinion:
In many areas, there is not 2 levels of HT and HTL, so the hospital/lab
pays the HT more than the MLT, as sort of a half-way point between 
a MLT and MT, with more emphasis on being like the MLT.

However, at some hospitals, they pay the MLT more than the HT, since
the MLT has an associate degree and gone through a NAACLS-accredited
training program and HT usually do not.

Every place is different.

Have your Human Resources do a salary survey of equivalent hospital
labs in the area. Most places to this periodically. Maybe they haven't
done HT recently, and need to update their information. Maybe in your 
area, MTL are paid more (for whatever reason), and you are being 
paid equivalent. 

If your lab is doing tests that other hospitals are not doing,
or if you require different education, skills, training or
certification than the other HT labs, let your HR know this.
Years ago, we found out we were being paid less than most
of the labs that were sending their kidney biopsies, 
muscle enzyme biopsies and IM to us, plus all of us were 
ASCP certified (as required by our lab/hospital). When we 
included this information with our request to HR, we did 
see a wage increase (about a year later - change takes
time).

Hope this helps.

**************************
Peggy A. Wenk, HTL(ASCP)
William Beaumont Hospital
Royal Oak, MI 48073