PHI has updated an annual report, “Direct Care Workers in the United States: Key Facts” provides a snapshot of the direct care workforce demographics. The report includes details on job quality challenges, projected job openings and detailed overviews of home care workers, residential care aides and nursing assistants in nursing homes. Read the full report here.
PHI’s new report shows:
- From 2020 to 2021, the direct care workforce added nearly 1.5 million new jobs, growing from 3.2 million workers to 4.7 million. This growth trend will continue as this workforce is expected to add an estimated 1.2 million new jobs from 2020 to 2030—more new jobs than any other occupation in the country. This job growth will occur primarily in the home and community-based services sector, with the home care and residential care workforces projected to increase in the next decade by 37 and 22 percent, respectively. In contrast, the nursing assistant workforce is expected to continue steadily decreasing in size.
- When accounting for jobs that must be filled when existing workers transfer to other occupations or exit the labor force, there will be an estimated 7.9 million total job openings in direct care from 2020 to 2030.
- COVID-19, among other developments, has dramatically altered the long-term care sector’s approach to staffing. For example, more than three in five nursing homes (62 percent) relied on nursing assistants from staffing agencies to fill staffing vacancies in 2021 for a median of 166 days during the year. Nursing home reliance on staffing agencies increased notably from 2020 when 41 percent of nursing homes used contract nursing assistants for a median of 89 days during the year.
