Excerpt from: Direct Care Alliance, Inc (click for full article)
A resource released today explains how all home care stakeholders—clients and their family members, employers and workers—will benefit once home care workers are assured the right to minimum wage and overtime pay. Produced by PHI and announced at a conference call for members of the media hosted by PHI, DCA and other members of the campaign to win these basic rights, We Can’t Wait! is a collection of testimonials gathered by DCA and our allies.
A few facts and statistics about the regulations and the home care workforce are sprinkled throughout the 68-page publication, but it is almost entirely devoted to dozens of stories from key home care stakeholders.
That makes We Can’t Wait! a powerful tool for advocates of the rule change, and a useful resource for reporters and others who want to better understand what is at stake. To quote its introduction: “at its core this is about real people—men and women, elders and people with disabilities who need the assistance of home care workers to live independently and with dignity. It is about the home care workers themselves, who care deeply about their clients, but must also support their own families. They work long hours and often two jobs but still must rely on public assistance to make ends meet. It is also about employers trying to do the right thing and pay fair wages but who find themselves at a competitive disadvantage with those exploiting the companionship exemption to maximize profits. These are their stories.”
We Can’t Wait! was funded by the Ford Foundation.
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