With Seattle's entry-level workforce in high demand, employers struggle to keep up

These should be salad days for Careforce, a Lynnwood company that provides in-home nursing and care services in the greater Seattle area. With local baby boomers getting older — and with hospitals shifting to less expensive outpatient care — demand for the home care is soaring.

But like other local providers, Careforce can’t hire fast enough to meet that rising demand, despite bumping starting wages for some positions to $17. “It’s a huge problem for us,” says Geoff Meinken, a Careforce senior executive. “We’re leaving a lot of potential revenue out there because we just don’t have enough people.”

Seattle’s home-care labor crunch has several causes. The job is physically and emotionally taxing. It also requires extensive training: Aides need a 75-hour state certification course before they can work in a field that, as Meinken notes, often pays less than a pizza deliverer earns.

And that’s a problem, because when Meinken goes recruiting, he’s competing against not only other healthcare providers, but also pizza places, grocery stores, Amazon warehouses, Uber and Lyft, and nearly any other business that relies on low-wage workers, but can’t find enough of them.

Read more: https://www.seattletimes.com/business/with-seattles-low-skill-workforce-in-high-demand-employers-struggle-to-keep-up/