Policy Proposal for Joe

VP Biden should announce that he will propose a National Institute for Home Health Work.  

In doing so, he will allow us to address a critical future need of our society and develop the value of a widespread, under-trained and under-paid service. 

Why Home Health Work?  - It is a demographic fact that the numbers of retired people, at all levels of health, are increasing dramatically, and we should expect those to continue.  

The coronavirus epidemic in the US and other countries has shown us that concentrations of people with compromised health conditions can be explosively dangerous in the case of contagious disease.  Many or most retirees would prefer to live at home, if the right care can be provided to them. 

The quality of service provided by home healthcare providers is, in general, not good enough.  In the employment marketplace today, that work is understood to be underpaid and unstable, with its main advantage being easy entry,  great demand, and easy exit.  A few manage to land private placements with more stability, but most wash out or give up. 

That is not the kind of care that people need.  There is an identifiable range of necessary skills, from first aid, medication assistance, and making good judgement calls on emergency assistance, to practical things like assisting around the house, cooking, and helping with transportation for clients.  A nationally-recognized certification and training program would assist agencies in finding qualified employees, who would legitimately expect to be paid better than today's norm. 

How? and Where? -  Most of the training needs to be done remotely, through a thin network of accredited centers which primarily recruit and coordinate, providing technical communications assistance as needed, as well.

The rollout should look like this: 

• Bring in a small group of experienced workers, public health and safety experts, and trainers from top-rated agencies and video training experts to develop curriculum. 
• Recruit initial groups from among top-rated home health workers to 'train the trainers'. Ensure maximum diversity.  These trainers are the permanent employees of the institute and would create a new professional corps.
• Fine-tune the balance of "lectures", "interactive discussions", and "hands-on monitored sessions", adjusting over time with feedback from trainers.  Provide secondary assistance in a variety of foreign languages, and create an additional language certification for workers able to assist in them. 
• Testing of learners should similarly engage online, written, and hands-on demonstrations.  The goal is to provide valid credentials and guide learners to additional training where necessary before going or returning to the field. 

The location of the Institute should be in South Florida.  That's where the greatest numbers of both clients and potential learners reside.  Other centers should be in similar magnet areas where there is unmet demand for high-quality home health workers. 

I would make a rough estimate that the whole process to initiate and roll out the program would cost $500 million.  After that, the annual cost of the service should be no more than one-tenth that; clearly the service should charge a fee, but it should be one that recognizes the public value being created, and the length of the course--some 3-6 months for workers with previous experience, a year for those without--will make it cost-effective for tens of thousands. 

Someone who has access please pass this on to the Biden-Harris campaign!