The need to invest in care at scale is urgent. In that urgency, policymakers cannot overlook the importance of designing policy that ensures that care jobs are good jobs and that care workers have power on the job. Doing so is key to ensuring that the care provided is the quality that the public and the economy needs, and that the investment endures over time.

By investing in care infrastructure and adopting policies that build the power of care workers, we can: (1) increase the care supply and expand the number of care jobs available in the labor market; (2) improve the quality of care; (3) ensure that historically marginalized workers have a democratic voice in the workplace; and (4) establish a constituency with a direct stake in defending investments in care.

This explainer begins by providing background information important for understanding the care worker context before exploring why building power of care workers would impact the supply and quality of care and create new policy feedback loops. It concludes with examples of policies that can achieve these goals.

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Key Takeaways

  • Care work is among the fastest-growing sectors of our economy, yet many care jobs are characterized by long hours, low pay, and exploitative conditions. Without meaningful change, the sector will continue to experience workforce shortages, high turnover, and reduced care quality while entrenching racial and gender inequities and further eroding worker wellbeing. Building worker power is foundational to changing this trajectory.
  • The major cost driver of care is compensation for the workers who provide it.1 Over the next decade, employment in the care sector will grow twice as fast as any other industry, adding hundreds of thousands of jobs each year.2 Because care is labor-intensive, worker compensation is necessarily a significant share of its cost – but today’s low wages are not an inherent feature of that cost structure. They reflect a profit-driven care industry that suppresses pay to preserve margins. Our policy choices on the ways and amounts we invest in these jobs will determine both the quality of the good that is provided and the strength of the constituencies that shape the political economy of care.
  • If, instead, policymakers extend basic labor protections that build power for care workers and invest public dollars in care at the necessary scale, the sector will deliver quality jobs, dignified work, and better care for families. This, in turn, will strengthen the economy and increase the economic and political power of Black and brown workers.
  • Some state and local governments have already begun to adopt policies that expand labor rights, treat care as public infrastructure the government has a role in shaping, set sectoral standards, and invest more deeply in care. These policies are establishing higher quality care for families, more equitable outcomes for Black and brown communities, and a more sustainable and robust economy.
  • When paired with policies that support care worker power, policies that invest in care create policy feedback loops that strengthen our care infrastructure for the better and ensure it endures into the future.

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