Demand is rising for direct care workers (including personal care aides, home health aides, and nursing assistants), but recruitment and retention challenges are widespread. While the COVID-19 pandemic has greatly exacerbated these challenges, it has also created a new labor pool of millions of workers who have been displaced from occupations with similar entry-level requirements. However, little is known about whether and how these displaced workers could be re-employed in direct care jobs.

This report explores how direct care workers and workers from similar entry-level occupations became unemployed during the COVID-19 pandemic; to what extent the skills of displaced workers align with those of direct care occupations; and how many displaced workers re-entered the workforce (including into direct care jobs) within the following year.