FOOD for Thought: Kurt Ullrich, in his “Further Reflections” column on Oct. 26, discussed his recent experience as a construction worker doing work for a day in an Iowa nursing home. He mentioned the residents and the paid caregivers assisting and supporting them. He discussed his encounter with a nice elderly woman who, while not being able to remember where her home was, wanted his help in getting there. He described the compassion of the direct-care worker who assisted her and others, helping them to “try to make sense of a world that hasn’t quite figured out what to do with them.” And he commented on the low wage these workers make, putting their work and their value in contrast with the million-dollar baseball players he watched on TV when he got home from work. Ullrich expressed concern that the people who work in direct care might question their own value and worth due to the low wage they are paid. He closed by saying, “We need them, and one day I’ll need them, a hell of a lot more than I’ll need a guy who can run down a fly ball or throw a knuckle ball.” He referred to society’s value of the baseball player over the caregiver as “craziness.” I certainly can’t argue with that. A few points to supplement Ullrich’s observations: • The direct-care workers he described are Iowa’s largest and one of its fastest-growing occupations. While many work in nursing facilities, most work in the residences of Iowans and in community-based settings assisting people of all ages with a disability. • The direct-care occupation totals 73,000 people in Iowa. Iowa needs an additional 20,000 of these workers by 2020 to meet the growing demand for services. • Wages for direct-care staff average $9 to $11 per hour in most settings. Those who work on the front lines in nursing homes actually make a little more than that — averaging $11 to $12. • It’s not just the wage that sends the message about if and how much these workers are valued. Twenty-five percent of them have no health insurance. Less than 50 percent have any retirement plan other than Social Security. Less than 50 percent have access to sick leave. • Few of these workers have career opportunities that allow them to grow, take on additional responsibility and enhance their earning power in the direct-care field. • The lack of respect given to them is reflected in what people, including some of their employers, say about them too often. These workers are often inappropriately referred to as low-skilled, dime-a-dozen, entry-level workers. The work is often discounted by being called “women’s work” in a derogatory manner. • Training received by these workers in too many cases does not adequately prepare them for the duties and responsibilities of the job. • As a result of everything mentioned above, this occupation is a revolving door of workers entering and leaving. Turnover averages around 60 percent yearly. When good people leave the profession, the quality of care and service suffers. In addition, tax dollars are spent to constantly recruit new people rather than to invest in keeping people. So let’s stop and think about this for a minute. Here we have Iowa’s largest, and one of its highest-demand, occupations. It’s one of Iowa’s biggest workforce development challenges, with huge implications for the health and quality of life of Iowans. These are not “some other” Iowans, but you, me, our families, friends and neighbors. And we, as a state, have no plan to address it. This isn’t rocket science. The solutions to recruiting and retaining good workers are well known. The basic question is whether leaders in business and government care enough about this problem to address it. Not to study it, but to act on it. To date, the answer has been no. It’s in everyone’s interest to make the answer a yes. The answer will change if Iowans talk about it and tell their leaders to make it a priority. If you care about those who provide the care, then please, let your voice be heard!
Posted on: Wed, 13 Nov 2013 19:49:07 +0000
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