266012 Caregiving Across the Lifespan: An Overview of Numbers, Needs and Promising Practices

Monday, October 29, 2012 : 2:50 PM - 3:10 PM

Pamela Tau Lee , Labor and Community Studies, City College of San Francisco, San Francisco, CA
Maria Reyes , National Organizer, National Domestic Worker Alliance, Oakland, CA
Michael Lyon , Organizer, San Francisco Grey Panthers, San Francisco, CA
Jill Shenker , Field Director, National Domestic Worker Alliance, Oakland, CA
The United States is facing a massive crisis in caring for its most vulnerable populations: young children, people with disabilities, and seniors. Today, 52% of children under four are cared for by a non-relative. By 2030, 20% of the total U.S. population will be over 65. Although 3 million are currently employed in the long-term care workforce, demand is projected to grow to 27 million by 2050. Personal, home care, and home health aides are among the fastest and largest growing occupations in the United States, however these occupations also have high rates of job turnover and work-related injury because of the lack of job training, job security, and isolated workplaces. These and other domestic workers, such as nannies and housecleaners, also lack basic legal workplace protections afforded to most other workers, increasing their risk of abuse and exploitation.

This session will present an overview of caregiving in the United States today, including the demographics of caregivers and care recipient and factors impacting occupational health and safety inside private homes and the rapidly growing demand for non-institutional, in-home caregivers. The session will also discuss the interdisciplinary and cross-sectoral nature of caregiving, as it impacts the health and well-being of women, children, families, immigrants, seniors, the disabled, labor unions, and others. The session will conclude with several case studies of promising local, state, and national practices to address the national crisis in caregiving, including local and national Caring Across Generations campaign activities and regulatory changes by state and federal labor agencies.

Learning Areas:
Administration, management, leadership
Advocacy for health and health education
Public health or related laws, regulations, standards, or guidelines
Public health or related organizational policy, standards, or other guidelines
Public health or related public policy
Systems thinking models (conceptual and theoretical models), applications related to public health

Learning Objectives:
1) Name three labor laws that have historically excluded domestic workers from workplace health, safety, and wage protections afforded other workers 2) Define five factors affecting the crisis in caregiving in the United States today 3) Identify three promising practices to protect domestic workers’ occupational health, safety, and well-being

Keywords: Caregivers, Workforce

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I have been involved in community based research with low-wage and immigrant workers and the environmental justice movement for over thirty years and received local and national recognition for my work. I have been actively involved in the Caring Across Generations campaign as a leader in the San Francisco Care Council via collaboration with San Francisco Jobs with Justice.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.