What Happens When There’s No One To Care For Our Elders?

“‘This will be catastrophic’: Maine families face elder boom, worker shortage in preview of nation’s future,” from The Washington Post, could be a description of a dystopian movie: it’s not. This is the state of State of Maine, which is the harbinger of things to come for the rest of these 50 United States.  We need to listen to this alarm.

We’re facing a demographic dilemma: not enough young people to fill all jobs, even those outside of elder care.  We need them now!  Where do we get them?  We can’t hire them because they were never born!  Thus, current workers remain on the job long after it’s safe or appropriate.  Results include accumulated injuries to workers who keep doing injurious jobs. Even the field of healthcare can’t find enough workers or volunteers.

The State of Maine has learned that there is no one available to fill home care jobs.  There is no one to fill care facility jobs either.   Professional fields have the same problem; many of the number of nurses and doctors are now older and there are not enough of them it is  and there’s no one to replace them.

Medicaid pays far less than other employers, drawing the few workers away from elder care. However, simply raising wages won’t help if there are not enough people to hire!

Maine is already experiencing the results, some facilities closed altogether.  Others closed admissions for months due to too few staff.  No vacancies in care facilities means families must place their loved ones wherever they can.  A loved one far away means a l-o-n-g commute to visit.  Younger, disabled people also get caught in this care-crunch.  If no one is available, some adult children try to fill the gap. Those care gaps further pressure the few remaining working adult children.

Keep this number in mind:

*By 2030, 1 in 5 Americans will be over 60.  

*The number of seniors will DOUBLE between 2015 and 2050.  

*The senior population over 85 will TRIPLE in that same period. 
 
**We will need 7.8 MILLION new people to fill these jobs.  Since we didn’t give birth to them; where do we get them?

This isn’t as riveting as a news story as a fire, or a shooting, that’s the problem.  The numbers of affected families are there, but they aren’t collected (aggregated).  This problem is spread everywhere.

We’re in a presidential campaign yet no candidate is talking about this national problem. Why? This demographic dilemma is happening one family at a time: Your family is next.