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She has been on three buses from her Panorama City home to work as a caregiver for a dementia woman in 83-year-old Sherman Oaks, and is worried that she will be plagued by federal agents recently.
B when asked what she would do if she was deported. was 60 years old and asked to withhold his name and paused to compose himself.
“I don’t want to cry,” she said, but losing her hourly job is devastating as she sends money to the Philippines to support her family.
Steve Lopez
Steve Lopez is a California native who has been a columnist for the Los Angeles Times since 2001. He has won over 12 National Journalism Awards and is a four-time Pulitzer finalist.
Thanks to a wave of epic demographics, the world is grey every day. In California, 22% of state residents are over 65 by 2040, an increase of 14% from 2020.
“When it appears that fewer and fewer people want to work in long-term care, the need has grown more than ever,” Harvard Healthcare Policy Analyst David C. Grabowski told Emily Alpertreyes of the Times in January.
So, how can millions of aged Americans take care of physical and cognitive decline, especially given President Trump’s big, beautiful proposed cuts to Medicaid, which covers about two-thirds of nursing home residents? And who cares for people who don’t have a family to step up?
The building where multiple caregivers live in a sloppy studio apartment in Panorama City.
(Jason Armand/Los Angeles Times)
There is no good answer at this time. Deportation providers may make sense if they had plans to make the job more attractive to homemade alternatives, but none of us had wagered the donut a day ago.
Nationally and in California, the majority of workers in care facilities and private environments are citizens. But employers have already struggled to recruit and maintain staff for low-paid, challenging jobs, but now Trump administration policies could further reduce the workforce.
Earlier this year, the administration put an end to a program that provides temporary protected status and job approval. The latest goal in Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration is to make 3,000 arrests every day.
“People are worried about the threat of deportation, but they are also worried about losing the jobs they have and not being able to secure other jobs,” said Aquilina Soriano Versoza, director of the Pilipino Workers Center, who estimated that about half of the members of the advocacy group were undocumented.
In the past, employers haven’t necessarily requested job approval documents, but that has changed, she said. And given the political situation, she fears that some employers will “feel exempt from exploiting workers,” many of whom are women from Southeast Asia, Africa, the Caribbean, Mexico and Latin America.
It could have already happened.
“We’ve seen a lot of fear, and when it comes to fighting wage theft, we’ve seen workers who no longer want to pursue their lawsuit,” said Yvonne Medrano, an employment rights lawyer for Bet Tzedek, a nonprofit organization in legal services.
A gathering at the Pilipino Workers’ Center in Los Angeles, historic Philippine town. Aquilina Soriano Versoza, director of the center, said: “People are worried about the threat of deportation.
(Ringo chiu / for the the the the alls
Medrano said he was worried that workers would be at greater risk of being kicked out of the country by pursuing justice in court. In one case, workers are owed a final salary for a discontinued job, but employers warned that it could be expensive to show up to search for it, stating that they committed a veiled threat.
Given the hostile environment, some workers have given up and gone home.
“We’ve seen workers self-promotion,” Medrano said.
Before Trump took office, the conditions for elderly care workers were bleak enough. Two years ago I met a documented, undocumented caregiver, who are involved in the healthcare business, but some of them didn’t have health insurance for themselves.
I met with cancer survivors and caregivers who rented a refurbished garage without a kitchen. And I visited an apartment in Panorama City. There, Josephine Bicler struggled with knee and shoulder injuries while working as a caregiver in the early ’70s.
Vicler shared a cramped studio with two other caregivers. They used room dividers to put the space into the bedroom. When I checked with Biclar this week, she said that four women shared the same space. They all have legal status, but due to low wages and high housing costs, they cannot afford to buy better living arrangements along with the burden of supporting families abroad.
B. And another care provider shares a single room from a homeowner in Panorama City, each at a cost of $400. B. says it takes more than an hour to commute, and during the nine-hour shift, duties for the 83-year-old client include cooking, feeding and bathing.
She only works three days a week at this time, but said the additional work would be difficult given her status and immigration crackdown. She was mad at how she couldn’t afford to send the money home for the past two months.
“People are not only worried about the threat of deportation, but also about losing the jobs they have and not being able to secure other jobs.
(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)
Retired UCLA scholar Fernando Torres Gill, who served as President Clinton’s deputy secretary for aging, said the “fear and confusion” of the elder care industry would likely not end in the presidential administration. And given the budget constraints, it’s hard for California to do more for caregivers and those in need of care.
However, he believes that a growing crisis could ultimately lead to awakening.
“We’re going to see people who are increasingly older without long-term care,” Torres Gill said. “Hopefully Democrats and Republicans can escape talking about open borders and talk about selective immigration,” he says to the country’s economic and social needs.
The United States is not aging on its own, Torres Gill pointed out. The same demographic changes and healthcare needs are colliding with the rest of the world, and other countries could open doors to workers who send packaging.
As “more baby boomers” join the class of people who need help, he said, “We might finally understand that we need some kind of leadership.”
It’s hard to be cynical these days, but I think he’s in something.
On the other hand, I follow the leads on this topic and move them in different angles. If you’re struggling to find care or pay, or if you’re on the frontline as a provider, I’d like to drop the line on me.
steve.lopez@latimes.com
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