Shortages of SLPs, OTs, and PTs

The editors of the Washington Post point out that there are critical shortages of certain categories of workers:

OCCUPATIONAL AND physical therapists. Religious workers. Plant operators. Railway personnel. Construction workers. Maintenance and repair workers. Firefighters. Social workers. Nurses. Funeral workers. Truckers. That’s only a brief sampling of the jobs in the United States for which there are severe shortages of available employees, and way more openings than applicants.

and then point to their one-size-fits-all solution to the problem:

rational immigration system, one that meets the labor market’s demands for workers in an array of skill categories and income levels, is the obvious antidote to chronic and predictable labor deficits. Unfortunately, the Trump administration, heedless of the pleas of employers, has implemented and proposed measures whose effect will deepen existing and future shortages. And it has done so even as the unemployment rate, now 3.7 percent, continues to bump along at near-historic lows.

Just to take the category of workers with whom they open their editorial, they are right that there are critical shortages of speech language pathologists, occupational therapists, and physical therapists, particularly localized shortages but their solution is claptrap. We can’t fill those jobs by importing workers. To do a satisfactory job in those fields you must be fluent in English and be equally fluent in our cultural norms in a way that is only possible for someone reared in the culture.

In many places the issue is not that the wages being offered are inadequate. It’s too late to address one of the primary reasons for the problem—increased demand. We have known there would be more elderly people in 2020 for more than 70 years. It has hardly snuck up on us.

More to the point the number of positions in programs has not kept pace with the increase in population being served and the requirements have inflated equally rapidly. Increasingly, doctorates are required.

I also can’t help but wonder if one of the reasons for the shortages is that young people are simply not aware of the opportunities and with such a long launching pad it’s difficult to prepare for jobs in those fields without having started in high school.

1 comment… add one
  • steve Link

    I haven’t seen any research on it, but just anecdotally I think that a lot of the kids who might have become PTs or OTs went to nursing school instead of having the longer training or even PA school. Kind of a shame as the ones I know who did choose those professions seem pretty happy and make pretty good money. I do think I would agree at least a bit that these is some lack of awareness. Will ask the kids on the team.

    “To do a satisfactory job in those fields you must be fluent in English and be equally fluent in our cultural norms ”

    Small, rural hospitals in our area are full of people for whom English is not the primary language as that is all they can find.

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