Caring for One Another as We Age: The Workforce That Makes Dignity Possible
How communities are building the elder care workforce our aging nation desperately needs, and why it matters for all of us.
A Demographic Transformation Already Underway
The United States is in the midst of the most significant demographic shift in its history. According to U.S. Census Bureau projections, the population aged 65 and older grew by 38.6% between 2010 and 2020 alone, the fastest rate of growth for that age group since the 1880s. By 2030, every baby boomer will have crossed the age of 65, meaning that one in five Americans will be at or past traditional retirement age. By 2034, older adults are projected to outnumber children for the first time in American history.
The numbers are staggering. The 65-and-older population is expected to climb from roughly 58 million in 2022 to approximately 78 million by 2040, and to nearly 82 million by 2050, a 42% increase. Their share of the total population will rise from 17% to roughly 23%. Among those over 75, the growth is even more dramatic: the 85-and-older population is projected to more than double between 2020 and 2040, from about 6.7 million to over 14 million.
Behind every one of those numbers is a person: a parent, a grandparent, a neighbor, a mentor. Someone who built a career, raised a family, served their community. And as they age, many will need help. Not because they’ve failed, but because growing older in a body that changes is simply part of being human.
The question isn’t whether this wave is coming. It’s already here. The question is whether we’re building the workforce and the communities needed to meet it with compassion, professionalism, and dignity.
What the Elder Care Workforce Actually Looks Like
When we talk about “elder care,” it’s easy to think in abstractions. But the reality is a rich ecosystem of companies, roles, and career paths, many of them rooted in the very communities they serve.
Through RollieJobs’ job intelligence platform, which partners with chambers of commerce and economic development organizations to surface hyperlocal employment data, we can see exactly what this workforce looks like on the ground. Here’s a sample of the companies actively hiring in elder care and the kinds of positions they’re filling right now.
Village Caregiving: In-Home, Non-Medical Care at Scale
Village Caregiving is the largest privately owned home care agency in the country, with over 65 locations across 20 states and more than 4,000 employees. Founded in 2013 by three law school classmates, the company has grown from a single location in West Virginia into a major employer across the Midwest and Eastern United States.
Their mission, “Keep Your Heart at Home,” reflects a core truth about aging: the overwhelming majority of older adults want to stay in their own homes. Three-quarters of Americans over 65 express a preference for aging in place, and Village Caregiving exists to make that possible.
At the time of our most recent data pull, Village Caregiving had 749 active job postings across its network. Nearly all of these roles are directly related to elder care: In-Home Caregivers, CNAs, HHAs, and overnight aides working in communities from Norwalk, Ohio to Lafayette, Indiana to Bardstown, Kentucky. These are part-time and full-time hourly roles, and they represent one of the largest single concentrations of elder care employment in our job database.
The positions require compassion above all, though certifications like CNA, HHA, and CPR are preferred. The company offers dental insurance, flexible scheduling, life insurance, and referral bonuses. Village Caregiving demonstrates that elder care isn’t just a calling. It can be a sustainable career with real benefits.
Trinity Health Senior Communities: The Full Continuum
Trinity Health Senior Communities (THSC) represents the institutional side of elder care. A national non-profit and part of Trinity Health, the second-largest Catholic health system in the country, THSC serves more than 35,000 seniors annually across 20+ communities in multiple states.
Their scope is broader than in-home care. THSC operates independent living, assisted living, memory care, skilled nursing, short-term rehabilitation, subsidized senior housing, hospice, and PACE programs (Programs of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly). This continuum means they hire across a wide spectrum of roles.
In our hub data, THSC currently lists 143 active positions: RNs, LPNs, and licensed practical nurses working in long-term skilled nursing facilities from Holyoke, Massachusetts to Fraser, Michigan. These are clinical roles requiring licensure, and they represent the higher end of the elder care career ladder.
Graceworks Lutheran Services: Faith-Based, Multi-Service Care
Founded in 1926 and based in Dayton, Ohio, Graceworks Lutheran Services is a faith-based nonprofit that connects people searching for a place to call home with services built around community and wholeness. They operate across five service lines: senior living, home health care, disability support, affordable housing, and hospice care.
Graceworks’ 30 active job postings span the full range of elder care work, from Home Health Aides and CNAs to Licensed Practical Nurses and Physical Therapists. Their Bethany Village community has been Dayton’s largest Continuing Care Retirement Community for 80 years, and their home health division provides skilled nursing, physical therapy, occupational therapy, and speech therapy in clients’ homes.
What makes Graceworks notable is the depth of their employee benefits: competitive wages, paid holidays with differential pay, shift differentials for second and third shifts, tuition reimbursement, scholarship opportunities, and a 403(b) retirement plan. For workers looking to build a long-term career in elder care, these kinds of investments matter.
Senior1Care: Family-Owned, Training-Integrated
Senior1Care is a family-owned home care agency founded in 2006 by Carl Bossung and his three sons in Indiana. The company was born from personal experience. The Bossung family couldn’t find quality, reliable agencies to serve Carl’s mother Loretta, who lived independently until age 95. So they built one.
Today, Senior1Care operates across six Indiana locations (Angola, Elkhart, Fort Wayne, Indianapolis, South Bend, and Warsaw) with 11 active job postings for caregivers and CNAs.
What sets Senior1Care apart is that they own and operate Legacy Medical Academy, a certified nursing assistant training school. This integration of training and employment means they’re not just filling positions. They’re building the pipeline. Many Legacy Medical Academy graduates go directly into Senior1Care roles, creating a self-sustaining cycle of workforce development.
OPS Living: Affordable Assisted Living
OPS Living (One Purpose Senior Living) operates 6 assisted living and memory care communities across Indiana, from South Bend to Bloomington. Their focus on affordability addresses one of the most pressing challenges in elder care: making quality support accessible to seniors who can’t afford premium pricing.
With 22 active positions spanning care staff, dining, and maintenance roles, OPS Living demonstrates that elder care facilities require more than just clinical workers. Cooks, maintenance technicians, activity coordinators, and community leadership are all essential to creating environments where older adults can thrive.
Our Hospice of South Central Indiana: End-of-Life Care
Our Hospice represents one of the most important, and most overlooked, segments of elder care: hospice and palliative services. Their current hiring includes a Nurse Practitioner - Palliative Care position in Columbus, Indiana. These are hybrid roles that blend clinical expertise with deep compassion, serving patients and families through some of life’s most difficult passages.
Margaret Mary Health: Rural Hospital Care
Margaret Mary Health in Batesville, Indiana illustrates how elder care intersects with rural healthcare. Among their active positions is a Registered Nurse - Hospice role, reflecting the reality that in smaller communities, hospitals often serve as the anchor institution for elder care services.
The Workforce Gap: A Crisis in Slow Motion
The jobs listed above aren’t just openings. They’re symptoms of a massive and growing labor shortage.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, home health and personal care aides are now the single largest occupation in the United States, with approximately 4.3 million workers as of 2024. The BLS projects an additional 740,000 new positions in this category by 2034, representing 17% growth. Healthcare support occupations and healthcare practitioners are among the fastest-growing occupational groups in the economy, projected to grow 12.4% and 7.2% respectively over the next decade.
But growth in demand doesn’t automatically translate to growth in supply. Research from Harvard Public Health projects approximately 4.6 million unfilled home care jobs by 2032. MIT economist Jonathan Gruber has described the current moment as “peak demand” for aging baby boomers, with a critical labor shortage driven by a mismatch between rising demand and inadequate compensation.
The math is brutal. The average base salary for home health and personal care aides was $16.82 per hour in May 2024, just $1.75 more per hour than fast food workers, despite requiring more training, greater physical endurance, and far more emotional labor. Annual turnover rates in home health frequently exceed 60-80%, creating what one industry analysis describes as a “constant recruiting treadmill.”
This is why companies like Senior1Care investing in their own training academy, or Graceworks offering tuition reimbursement and shift differentials, matter so much. They’re not just filling jobs. They’re fighting to make elder care a career that people can build a life around.
Where the Money Is Going: Venture Capital Discovers Aging
For years, the aging economy was largely ignored by venture capital. Despite representing a $9 trillion market, with the broader longevity economy composing 46% of the entire U.S. economy, less than 2% of venture capital historically flowed into aging-related solutions. As one venture partner at AgeTech Capital put it at a recent industry forum: “If aging were a startup, it would be the biggest unicorn and still underfunded.”
That’s changing. A new wave of dedicated AgeTech funds has emerged:
Equitage Ventures closed a $47.3 million fund in 2025, led by a team with deep roots in senior housing and senior living operations. Their focus is on compliance infrastructure, documentation automation, and passive monitoring, the behind-the-scenes technology that helps care facilities operate more efficiently while keeping residents safer.
Longevity Venture Partners closed a $30 million fund dedicated to aging-in-place and longevity solutions, investing in companies like Carefull (financial protection for older adults) and Voxela (smart sensor technology for senior care).
Primetime Partners, founded by veteran investor Alan Patricof and former SoulCycle executive Abby Miller Levy, focuses on healthcare, financial services, and consumer products that transform quality of living for older adults.
Right at Home Corporate Ventures launched a $5 million seed-stage fund specifically targeting startups focused on enabling aging at home, leveraging their network of 600+ franchise locations as a built-in distribution channel.
Recent funding rounds tell the story of where the smart money sees opportunity: $43 million for TSOLife, over $100 million for SafelyYou (AI-powered fall detection in senior care), and $25 million for SafeinHome’s IoT-enabled independent living platform.
The investment thesis is straightforward: the demographic wave is undeniable, the existing care infrastructure is insufficient, and technology can augment (not replace) human caregivers to extend their reach and effectiveness.
The Niches Within Elder Care
Elder care isn’t monolithic. The companies in our RollieJobs data reveal a field with distinct specializations, each addressing different aspects of aging:
In-Home Non-Medical Care is the largest segment, encompassing companionship, meal preparation, light housekeeping, bathing assistance, medication reminders, and transportation. Village Caregiving and Senior1Care represent this category: high-volume employers offering entry points into healthcare careers with relatively low barriers to entry.
Assisted Living and Memory Care facilities like OPS Living provide residential environments with 24-hour care teams, structured activities, and medication management. Memory care, specifically for individuals with Alzheimer’s and dementia, is a growing specialization as the Alzheimer’s Association projects nearly 13 million Americans will be living with the disease by 2050.
Skilled Nursing and Rehabilitation requires licensed professionals (RNs, LPNs, physical therapists, occupational therapists) and represents the clinical core of elder care. Trinity Health Senior Communities and Graceworks both operate in this space, with positions that command higher wages and offer clearer career advancement.
Hospice and Palliative Care serves patients approaching the end of life, with an emphasis on comfort, pain management, and emotional support for both patients and families. Our Hospice of South Central Indiana and Margaret Mary Health’s hospice nursing positions reflect this critical and deeply compassionate corner of elder care.
Home Health (Medical) bridges the gap between hospital care and independent living. Graceworks’ Bethany Village Home Health Care provides skilled nursing, physical therapy, and speech therapy in patients’ homes, allowing people to recover from surgery or manage chronic illness while remaining in familiar surroundings.
Supporting Services round out the ecosystem. Companies like IPU (Innovative Products Unlimited) manufacture PVC healthcare equipment: shower chairs, walkers, toilet safety frames, the physical tools that help older adults maintain independence. Packaged Meal Kit provides shelf-stable, nutritionally compliant meals for senior feeding programs. REVU MFG builds tiny homes and ADUs designed specifically for senior living. These companies don’t provide direct care, but they make care possible.
What We Can Do: Building a Workforce of Dignity
The elder care workforce crisis isn’t a problem that solves itself. But the companies, investors, and communities profiled here point toward a set of concrete actions:
Invest in training pipelines. Senior1Care’s Legacy Medical Academy model, training CNAs who then enter the company’s workforce, is a template worth replicating. When training is accessible, affordable, and connected to guaranteed employment, it removes barriers that keep talented people out of the field.
Make the economics work for caregivers. Graceworks offers shift differentials, tuition reimbursement, and retirement benefits. Village Caregiving provides health insurance and flexible scheduling across 749 positions. OPS Living has earned Great Place to Work certification. These aren’t luxuries. They’re the minimum viable investment in workforce retention when turnover exceeds 60%.
Leverage technology to extend human capacity. The $47 million flowing into Equitage Ventures’ portfolio isn’t replacing caregivers. It’s building AI-powered documentation, passive monitoring, and care coordination tools that let each caregiver do more with less administrative burden. The goal is to make the job of caregiving less about paperwork and more about people.
Recognize elder care as economic development. Village Caregiving employs 4,000+ people across 20 states. Trinity Health Senior Communities serves 35,000 seniors annually. Graceworks has been an employer in Dayton since 1926. These aren’t marginal players. They’re economic anchors in their communities. Chambers of commerce and economic development organizations should treat elder care workforce development with the same seriousness they bring to manufacturing recruitment or tech sector growth.
Make aging in place the default, not the exception. Three-quarters of older adults want to stay home. Investment in home modification, in-home care services, and community-based support networks (the kind of infrastructure that companies like Village Caregiving and Senior1Care provide) is typically far less expensive than institutional care and far more aligned with what seniors actually want.
Support family caregivers. Behind the professional workforce is an army of unpaid family caregivers: spouses, children, and neighbors who provide the majority of long-term care in America. Respite care (offered by both Village Caregiving and Senior1Care), family consultation services, and workplace flexibility policies are essential to preventing caregiver burnout.
The Promise We Make to Each Other
Every society is judged by how it treats its most vulnerable members. As we age, we all become more vulnerable: to illness, to isolation, to the slow erosion of the independence we built our lives around.
The companies in these pages, from a family-run agency in Angola, Indiana to a 100-year-old faith-based nonprofit in Dayton to a national Catholic health system serving 35,000 seniors, are doing the daily work of honoring that vulnerability. They’re hiring CNAs at $16 an hour in small-town Kentucky, recruiting hospice nurses in rural Batesville, training the next generation of caregivers through their own academies, and building affordable assisted living communities in places like Elkhart and Kokomo.
This is not glamorous work. But it is essential work. And as our nation ages at a pace we’ve never experienced before, it is among the most important work there is.
The elder care workforce isn’t just a labor market category. It’s a promise we make to one another: that when you can no longer do it all alone, someone will be there. Someone trained, someone compassionate, someone paid a living wage for work that requires the full measure of their humanity.
Building that workforce, and building it right, is how we ensure that every American gets to grow older with dignity.
Data on companies and job postings sourced from the RollieJobs hyperlocal job intelligence platform. Demographic projections from the U.S. Census Bureau. Workforce statistics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Investment data from industry reporting and public fund announcements. All job counts reflect the most recent data available as of March 2026.
