And on July 2, 2025, the Trump Administration’s Department of Labor (DOL) put them all at risk by proposing that essential workplace rights and protections - like earning at least minimum wage and overtime – be revoked. [2]

This already overworked and undervalued workforce provides much needed services to aging adults and people with disabilities; denying their right to labor protections like federal minimum wage and overtime pay would be more than detrimental. It’s outrageous.

Health and home care workers are essential; that hasn’t changed. In fact the need for home care workers is growing. The U.S. population is aging, and the number of adults aged 65 and older is projected to grow from 57.8 million in 2022 to 88.8 million in 2060. [3]

This means there is a growing demand for a direct care workforce; one that is experienced and equipped to assist with tasks such as eating, dressing, and bathing.

But despite this fast-growing occupation, which is due in part to a growing population of older adults and the desire to age and receive care in place, wages for direct care workers are still incredibly low; the median wage for direct care workers was $16.72 per hour in 2023. [4]

Low wages among this group lead to high poverty rates; a startling 45 percent of home care workers live in low-income households, and one in six lives in a household below the federal poverty line. [5] So while home care workers are caring for us and our loved ones, many often face challenges and struggle to make ends meet.

For years, domestic workers and home care worker advocates fought to ensure all home care workers were covered by minimum wage and overtime laws…but now the DOL wants to roll back those protections and make it legal for agencies and households to pay subminimum wages and deny overtime to home care workers. This is harmful. This is not okay.

Eliminating home care workers’ right to minimum wage and overtime would negatively impact home care workers, care recipients, family caregivers, the care infrastructure, our communities, and our economy. It would increase the workforce shortage of home care workers and make it even more difficult to recruit and retain workers.

The majority of home care workers are women, immigrants and people of color, the latter of whom make up 63 percent of all home care workers even though people of color only make up 39 percent of the total U.S. labor force. [6] Historically, caregiving has been characterized as “women’s work,” a belief that is entrenched in stereotypes; both gendered and racialized. Home care workers are often undervalued and underpaid and as such have fought for decades alongside advocates to secure their civil rights and labor protections including wage protections, which was hard won in 2013.

Stripping the right to minimum wage and overtime pay protections from home care workers would be an insult to the care workforce, who provide vital services to our aging loved ones and those with disabilities.

*Please take a moment to take action – and then also to pass along this action link to other people in your life (and to post the action link on your social media).

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