Home care workers, clients deserve better from state

For years, our state’s 43,000 poorly paid home care workers have lived right on the edge of insolvency. Now, harsh new rounds of state budget cuts threaten to push them over that edge entirely.

Home care workers care workers do an important — and difficult — job. They assist vulnerable low-income seniors and people with disabilities to stay in their homes by helping them dress, clean, bathe, eat, shop, and remember to take their medications. For this work they are paid an average of $10.37 per hour, with the terms set by a contract with the state. While they are publicly funded, unlike state employees they have no pension and can purchase health care only for themselves — not for their families.

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