We all want our family and friends who are aging or have disabilities to be able to live at home with dignity and independence. But home and community care services are too hard to access -- they’re too expensive and there just aren’t enough caregivers. We have a chance to put caregiving at the center of our economy -- and to lift up millions of Black, Latina, and Asian women who do this essential, compassionate work.

This year has laid bare how broken our long term care system is. The home care workforce -- 90 percent women, more than half women of color, and nearly a third immigrant workers -- has been excluded from worker protections for decades. Home care workers didn’t even have federal minimum wage protection until 2015!

The COVID-19 relief bill was an important first step towards digging out of the economic crisis worsened -- but not begun -- by the pandemic. But for a true, equitable recovery, we need deep investments that center the women of color whose caregiving helps others go to their own jobs, and is central to so many American families.

Now, we have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to transform care in this country and redefine “women’s work” as the cornerstone of the economy that it is. We can provide high-quality care for our nation’s parents, grandparents, and people with disabilities through good union jobs. Now, Congress must deliver on the promises they made to the communities that put them in control.

It’s time to act! Recovery efforts aimed at bringing us out of this crisis must center Black, Latina, and Asian women and communities of color by investing in good union home care jobs and a long term care system we can all access and afford.