A Critical Labor Day Message – Employees Caring for Aging Loved Ones Disrupt the Workforce

This Labor Day weekend is great for reflecting on C-Suite leadership’s work-life and care work perspective.

OLDWICK, NJ, USA, September 3, 2024 /EINPresswire.com/ -- According to Pew Research, 10,000 boomers have their 65th birthday every day in America. At every stage in their lives, they disrupted infrastructure. The nation built schools and colleges. Housing and highways. Parks and shopping malls. Airports and transit systems. Television and media outlets. Office buildings and factories. And now more senior housing and skilled nursing facilities.

Employees increasingly find themselves in a dual role, balancing their professional responsibilities with the demands of caring for aging loved ones. Most still see this as a personal issue, a family problem. Perhaps even a healthcare industry issue. But the workforce issue must be addressed as a separate and even more pressing problem.

This Labor Day weekend is great for reflecting on C-Suite leadership’s work-life and care work perspective. Organizations are confronting a critical and stagnant issue—the glaring lack of support for employees and union members who balance work, self-care, life, and family commitments alongside caregiving for aging parents.

Despite clear expert recommendations, substantial shifts in workplace policies remain minimal. Deloitte recently published a perspectives document called “Reimagining health care delivery - Platforms propelling new care models.”

The Deloitte Report begins with...The healthcare industry stands at a pivotal juncture, grappling with escalating costs, labor shortages, and a dissatisfied consumer base. The conventional paradigms governing healthcare delivery and financing are being shattered, requiring a fundamental change—inspired by platforms and personalization.

America continues to address a caregiving challenge designed for 1970, not 2024. This is a working generation. Rarely is anyone readily available to undertake a family caregiving role that could escalate from part-time to a full-time commitment. Flexible schedules and leaves are necessary but insufficient to relieve the excessive burdens of a profoundly mismatched societal need and an outdated industrial response.

The Growing Demand for Caregiving

As life expectancy increases, so does the number of elderly individuals requiring care. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the number of people aged 60 years and older is expected to double by 2050, reaching 2.1 billion. The number of persons aged 80 years or older is expected to triple between 2020 and 2050 to reach 426 million.

This surge has placed many working-age adults in the position of having to care for aging parents or relatives. Employees often face the difficult choice between career progression and providing care, with many opting for reduced hours, less demanding roles, or even leaving the workforce entirely.

Realistically, navigating healthcare should be the responsibility of the healthcare industry, not employers whose primary focus is to run profitable businesses and maintain effective teams. Yet, employers are increasingly expected to fill these gaps. Essential employee benefits like streamlined access to resources and concierge systems are vital to assist in managing critical life, family, and caregiving resources, including financial, legal, and life planning professionals. These tools alleviate stress and reduce the time employees spend away from work managing caregiving crises.

About CareWise Solutions:
Provider of the Caring Place HUB app - Low-cost, Innovative Tech Option Empowers Caring. CareWise Solutions aligns with proposed models from Deloitte and other prestigious institutions. CareWise Solutions takes bold strides towards a future where our workforce is empowered to live joyfully, with career and financial matters in order, ample time for personal life, and confidence that the care needs of loved ones are met with seriousness and effective outcomes.

JEANNETTE GALVANEK
CAREWISE SOLUTIONS
jeannette@carewisesolutions.com
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The Employee Caregiver Crisis in America