Care Industries
Labor Center Projects
Care Industries Overview
Developmental Disabilities Research
Home Care Research
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Our society depends on working people in the human service industries.
They provide the professional care that allows seniors and people
with disabilities to live independently and with dignity in their
own homes. These professionals make it possible for working parents
to go to their jobs every day knowing their children are safe and
have good care.
In spite of their crucial role in society, wages and working conditions
in the human services industries—homecare, childcare, and care
for the elderly and people with disabilities — are among the
lowest in the state. In Alameda County, over one third of homecare
workers and their families live below the poverty line. Two in five
work more than one job to make ends meet. The challenging working
conditions in the care sector, including isolation from other workers,
lack of benefits, and low wages, mean that these workers, who dedicate
themselves to making other’s lives safer, healthier and more
comfortable live themselves without job security, financial stability,
or health and retirement benefits. These conditions lead to high turnover
rates and understaffing, negatively impacting not only the workers,
but also the quality of care they provide for consumers.
Throughout the U.S., workers in the human services are joining together,
in coalition with consumers and advocates, to improve these conditions.
In their struggle, they face many barriers. Service providers frequently
work in their client’s homes, within their own homes, or in
small nonprofit workplaces. These arrangements allow clients greater
comfort and freedom, but it also means the workers are dispersed over
a wide geographical area, making it difficult to develop a collective
plan for change. The lack of a single major employer in many sectors
also poses significant challenges for traditional strategies of collective
bargaining. Despite these obstacles, workers in the human services
are making tremendous progress through creative organizing strategies
and campaigns to reform policy.
The Labor Center is committed to supporting and consolidating this
important work by helping to expand the successes of home care organizing
to other sectors and the broader public and by addressing unanswered
concerns within the human services.
Photo by Richard Bermack |
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Of over 700 occupations surveyed by the Occupational Employment Statistics
in 2000, only 18 report having lower average wages than child care workers.
Those who earn higher wages than child care workers include service station
attendants, tree trimmers, crossing guards, and bicycle repairers.1
The mean hourly wages of child care workers in California is $9.06.2
In the past dozen years, nearly 150,000 home care workers in California have
organized into unions. By the end of 2003, the number should reach 200,000.3
1 "Current Data on Child Care Salaries and Benefits in the
United States." March 2002. Center for the Child Care Workforce.
2 "Current Data on Child Care Salaries and Benefits in the United States."
March 2002. Center for the Child Care Workforce.
3 "Homecare Worker Organizing in California: An Analysis of a Successful
Strategy." Delp, Linda and Katie Quan. Labor Studies Journal, Vol. 27, No. 1 (Spring
2002).
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