Health Care & Benefits

Direct care workers provide approximately 70 to 80 percent of the paid long-term care in the United States, making them vital to this system. Despite the essential care they provide for others, approximately 800,000 direct care workers don’t have health insurance and many more are underinsured and lack other benefits such as paid sick leave and vacation time.

Health care and other benefits are crucial elements to the stability of any workforce, particularly for one as physically and emotionally demanding as direct care. In fact, direct care workers have the nation’s highest rates of on-the-job injuries, mostly back and neck injuries caused by lifting people or helping them move from place to place. It’s an injustice that direct care workers don’t have access to the care and economic security that other health care workers depend on. Read more about workers' lack of health care and benefits (pdf).

Let's Make Things Right

Ensure Health Care & Other Benefits for Workers

The Direct Care Alliance empowers direct care workers to advocate for themselves, making their voices heard in the fight for affordable health care and economic security. The new health care law is a tremendous victory for the direct care workforce but there is more work to be done. To succeed in making quality health care and benefits such as paid sick leave available to direct care workers, we are:

• Ensuring that workers’ needs and voices are heard throughout the implementation process (pdf) of the new health care law, particularly the health care coverage and workforce provisions. Learn More.
• Supporting the Health Insurance Rate Authority Act of 2010 (S. 3078/H.R. 4757). This bill will restrict the ability of health insurance companies to impose massive rate hikes on its policyholders and help insured workers retain their coverage. Contact your Representatives.
• Supporting the Paid Sick Days Campaign. Spearheaded by the National Partnership for Women and Families, this campaign sponsors local, state and federal initiatives – including the Healthy Families Act (H.R. 1542/S. 910) to guarantee paid sick days for workers. Contact your Representatives.

Workers Advocate for Health Care Reform

• 2009: President Obama announces that health care reform is a top priority for his administration.
• 2009: DCA issues worker agenda for health care reform legislation in Direct Care Worker Principles for Health Care Reform (pdf).
• 2009: DCA Hill Day and other visits to Washington D.C. provide direct care workers with a voice in health care debate.
• 2009: DCA and PHI submit recommendations for health care reform to Senate leadership.
• 2009: At the urging of direct care workers, Senators Casey, Kohl and Feingold file an amendment in Senate health care reform bill to include direct care workers as a high priority focus area for the National Healthcare Workforce Commission. While amendment was ultimately excluded from final health care reform bill, over 40 organizations including workers, consumers and employers support legislation (pdf).
• 2009-2010: DCA and state worker associations submit dozens of correspondence and mobilize members in support of health care reform.
• 2010: Direct care workers contribute to enactment of historic health care reform legislation, expanding access to hundreds of thousands of uninsured and underinsured direct care workers! Read letter (pdf) and DCA fact sheet about how legislation impacts direct care workers (pdf).

Additional Resources

• DCA Fact Sheet: A Lack of Health Care & Benefits
• DCA Fact Sheet: What Health Care Reform Means for Direct Care Workers and Their Families
• DCA Congressional Agenda
• DCA: Direct Care Worker Principles for Health Care Reform
• PHI Health Care for Health Care Workers
• Families USA Health Care Reform Central: The Road to Implementation