A Mass. senior living community raised its minimum wage to keep its workers facing 'pure fatigue and exhaustion'

Almost all sectors of the healthcare industry have experienced a mass exodus of workers in the last year, including elder care. To hold on to its caregivers, Rogerson Communities, a nonprofit focused on senior living in the Worcester and Greater Boston areas, is trying something bold: raising the minimum wage to $16 an hour for all workers who care for seniors.

“We don't know what the future brings in terms of the pandemic, but we do know that we have to have competitive salaries and hourly wages for our employees, and that's across the board,” Rogerson Communities President Walter Ramos told Morning Edition host Sean Corcoran today.

The increased wage will apply to personal care assistants, drivers, dietary aides, maintenance workers — anyone who interacts with the elderly. He hopes to stem the early retirements caused by “pure fatigue and exhaustion.”

One of those workers is Tenesha Shanks-Okwara, a case manager in the adult day health program. She was hired by Rogerson in July and has worked in the industry for more than 16 years.

She said has always she taken pride in the rewarding work, but this year was difficult. “The pandemic caused such an eruption and all that we do, the people that we care for,” she said.

She says the pay increase will help workers like her who want to continue working in the field but struggle financially.

"I think it does make a difference," she said. "At least we know now that someone's … paying attention to the care that we give here, and that at some point in time, we hope to see that this increases so that we can feel more comfortable coming in and doing the work that we do every day, especially under these strange circumstances.”

Corcoran shared his own observations of seeing a 96-year-old woman who lives in low-income housing. Her home health aide resigned and she lives in social isolation for most of the week.

Ramos and Shanks-Okwara said the COVID-19 pandemic affected seniors and people with disabilities not only from the direct result of the virus, but also by disrupting their medication routines and preventing socialization and family visits that were vital for their health.

“We know that bringing about unplanned change for our elders is detrimental to their well-being,” he said. “We know that a change of location of where they're living is detrimental to their good health.”

Ramos says the wage increase is also aimed at maintaining consistency and stability for residents and avoiding upheaval caused by staff turnover. Unfortunately, the employee retention challenge is not new, Ramos explained. Senior living communities have faced the shortage “for decades.” The shortage of health care workers applies to nurses, certified nursing assistants and assistants for people with mobility issues.

“I think the pandemic brought about what was already there and highlighted it in a way that's very pronounced,” he said.

Increasing wages is not sustainable for many healthcare organizations, so Ramos plans to advocate that federal and state governments step in to pass legislation to address the shortage. And that shortage won’t go away with the pandemic.

“By 2030, almost one in five Americans will be 65 and older — more than 20 percent of our entire population,” he said. “If we don't address this issue now, we are going to have a problem that only gets worse as we move forward.”