Pay Caregivers Fairly with Ai-jen Poo
9/28/18 - Personal shero and labor innovator Ai-jen Poo joins us to discuss the politics of domestic work. How we can think about and pay for help with children, elders, and housework more fairly and comprehensively.
Transcript below.
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CREDITS
Producer: Gina Delvac
Hosts: Aminatou Sow & Ann Friedman
Theme song: Call Your Girlfriend by Robyn
Composer: Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs.
Associate Producer: Destry Maria Sibley
Visual Creative Director: Kenesha Sneed
Merch Director: Caroline Knowles
Editorial Assistant: Laura Bertocci
Ad sales: Midroll
LINKS
National Domestic Workers Alliance
Alia provides app-based benefits to domestic workers
The Fair Care Pledge: tools for creating fair agreements among individual households and in-home workers
TRANSCRIPT: Pay Caregivers Fairly with Ai-jen Poo
[Ads]
(1:00)
Aminatou: Welcome to Call Your Girlfriend.
Ann: A podcast for long-distance besties everywhere.
Aminatou: I'm Aminatou Sow.
Ann: And I'm Ann Friedman. I talked to someone who is like a personal hero of mine, personal shero, Ai-jen Poo who is the executive director . . .
Aminatou: Oh my god.
Ann: I know.
Aminatou: Labor icon. [Laughs]
Ann: I know. Icon.
Aminatou: I knew you talked to her but it's giving me goosebumps that you talked to her. We stand Ai-jen Poo hard in this family.
[Theme Song]
(1:55)
Aminatou: Whew child. Whew. [Laughs] Whew child. It's busy over here. It is very, very, very busy over here. You're on the road. I'm kind of on the road. We're almost going on CYG tour and I'm excited about it.
Ann: I think that you need to come up with your own version of astrology that's all about financial quarters where you're like if you're the type of person who thrives in Q3 or really gets going then here's the deal with your fall. If you're a Q1 bitch here is what is up with you in Q1. I really think there is a huge opportunity for you there because I am feeling acutely the fact that we really get our shit together and start making things happen for real in the fall.
Aminatou: I'm like serious back-to-school vibes with myself right now. I'm also excited that every outfit I loved in the summer I'm making everybody see in the fall because people need to see my summer outfits. [Laughs] This is how I was like when I was at school and I'm definitely doing it as an adult again. And I was like yeah, back to school bitch. It's the best. Okay, well speaking of Call Your Girlfriend tour tickets are still on sale at callyourgirlfriend.com/tour. I don't feel like I need to convince people to come. Do you like to have a good time? Do you want to talk about scammers? Do you want to LOL with your besties? Do you want to sip wine with us? Come on.
Ann: Come on. It is like, look, even though we feel intense pressure to make sure you're having a good time because we take seriously when people give us their hard-earned dollars for entertainment we are also having a good time despite that pressure. Everyone is having a great time. That is the crowning achievement I think of one of our shows. So yeah, come see us live. That would be great. Callyourgirlfriend.com/tour, and get whatever tickets are still left on sale.
Aminatou: What are we talking about today Ann?
(3:50)
Ann: So this episodes sprang I believe from a conversation that the three of us had about domestic work, domestic labor, and care-giving. The inspo for this episode is essentially rooted in a business that you patronize.
Aminatou: Yes. Part of doing this episode is because I had been looking for recommendations from pals about a new cleaning service. I have always used a cleaning service for my house and my former housekeeper has actually left the country and so I've been going through all these apps and I really didn't like it at all because apps, technology, the whole thing is weird. But a lot of friends recommended this service they were all using called Si Se Puede which is a women's cooperative. Si Se Puede means we can do it in Spanish. It is a labor-rallying cry. You know, learn about it. I started using this cleaning coop and it has been really an awesome experience. I know a lot of people feel intense amounts of guilt around hiring people to clean your house and really to me it goes back to is it labor that you can afford to outsource? And if you do you need to realize it is very important and actual noble labor and it's just a job like all jobs.
The reason that I love this coop, it is woman-owned and it is woman-owned. Everybody who is in the cleaning coop obviously is a coop member and you get to have a relationship with the person who cleans your house and you get to pay them a fair wage. Like I'm happy to actually pay this wage and know that it goes directly to the workers as opposed to going to some gross app that pays people late. It made me really think about what we think about women-owned businesses, what we think about domestic work, what it means to support domestic workers. Also to shine a light on the people who make your life easier. And, you know, I think a lot of us who are privileged to have these kinds of opportunities. You also have to acknowledge that there are other women who make your life easier and that was really important to me.
(6:00)
Ann: Yeah, completely. And I think I have been thinking about it because just in the course of my normal news and media listening this writer named Louis Hyman has been doing the rounds for a new book he wrote called Temp about temporary workers. And this is one of those things that I think is newly in vogue as a point of discussion in the past few years because tech people are interested in it. Like the notion that if you are driving for Uber or Lyft or if you are picking up and delivering groceries for InstaCart that is sort of one definition of a temp worker.
But when you really think about it there is a huge segment of the economy that has always been temp workers, people who have had a patchwork of clients and jobs to sort of add up to making ends meet. And a lot of those workers historically have been caregivers and people who provide domestic work. And so -- and that's just something that I think this journalist is not obscuring in his new book but I've been thinking about the ways that that conversation is not really centering the core of that workforce and the people who have been a part of that workforce for decades and decades and how it is kind of being framed as a newfangled thing.
And especially when you look at what's going on gender-wise, right? It's like oh, right, people kind of get interested in a big picture economic way when the demographics of the people doing that work are not predominantly women and predominantly people of color, right? And so I think that I'm interested in a conversation that re-centers people who are kind of the bulk of the temp and patchwork workforce.
Aminatou: Right. It's like, you know, if I don't know if a couple weeks you tuned into that news story about Jeffry Owens who was an actor on the Cosby Show.
Ann: Yes.
(7:45)
Aminatou: Some actually really terrible person took a picture of him or I guess a video of him working at a Trader Joe's and it was all over the news. The Daily Mail was like Cosby Actor Working at Trader Joe's. And then Fox News, the channel of the conservative people who believe in hard work, also shamed him for doing that. And it's been really fascinating to watch him step up and come out of the shadows of that and refuse to be publicly shamed and also explain to people the economics of the job that he does.
[Clip Starts]
Jeffry: There is no Job that is better than another job. It might pay better. It might have better benefits. It might look better on a resume and on paper, but actually it's not better. Every job is worthwhile and valuable and if we have a kind of re-thinking about that because of what's happened to me that would be great. But no one should feel sorry for me from a positive or a negative perspective. I've had a great life.
[Clip Ends]
Aminatou: A lot of people assume also that actors are these very wealthy people or that they're all known or that being in a popular TV show means that you get paid. And that was happening at the same time as the Cynthia Nixon campaign where Andrew Cuomo tried to hit her for being an LLC and he's like "You're a corporation!" And I was like "Sir, that is not how self-employment works." Whatever.
Ann: [Laughs]
Aminatou: But it was just a reminder to me about the fact that acting has also been a gig economy for a long time.
Ann: Right.
Aminatou: And so all of this . . . I realized how unsophisticated my own thoughts about a lot of what labor is is, you know what I mean? And I was like yeah, of course. I was like no wonder actors have to have strong union protections because it is actually a very volatile kind of work and it is part -- like Uber did not invent the gig economy; it's been around for a long time.
Ann: Right.
Aminatou: And so it's like that conversation is going on, but I also think that really remembering that hard work is hard work, right? And capitalism always tells you that you are your productivity which is a lie. It's actually not true. And we have these really ingrained ways of not respecting the labor of people who make some of the most valuable contributions actually to society. And so that's just been on my mind a lot.
(10:03)
Ann: Yeah, completely. And I think that we're also thinking about this as related to your recent conversation with Annie Lowery about universal basic income because it's another one of those really big-picture economic questions that somehow in the mainstream conversation has not centered women and in particular women of color who are -- like I said have decades of experience being like "This is our experience and this is what we would like." So I talked to someone who is like a personal hero of mine, personal shero, Ai-jen Poo who is the executive director.
Aminatou: Oh my god, labor icon! [Laughs]
Ann: I know. I know. Icon.
Aminatou: I knew you talked to her but it's giving me goosebumps that you talked to her. We stand Ai-jen Poo hard in this family.
Ann: We do. She is the executive director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance. She's a MacArthur Genius Award recipient. She is like a bad-ass . . .
Aminatou: Congrats to the MacArthur Genius people. [Laughs]
Ann: I mean yes.
Aminatou: Congrats to them.
Ann: Congrats to making a good choice. Yes. And also just someone who I think is a real innovator and part of a really powerful innovative group of people who are thinking about these issues in ways that are productive, in ways that hit on multiple different levels. They're thinking about it in a big picture economy way; they're thinking about it in ways that center workers; they're thinking about it in ways that center the people who employ those workers and looking across the board to say "How do we change these conditions?" Because this is a super-fast growing segment of the workforce that deserves all of our attention right now.
And I think it's also so important as feminists to engage with the work that she is doing because do you remember, god, this is now a very long time ago but there were a series of articles -- I'm thinking of like an Atlantic cover story written by Caitlin Flanagan in the early 2000s who were like "You don't have a feminist leg to stand on if you hire a nanny." That's basically the argument.
(12:05)
Aminatou: [Sighs] I just . . . you said Caitlin Flanagan and my whole body just recoiled.
Ann: It is this kind of faux gotcha used against feminists of economic privilege to kind of be like you're not legit. And I think that is such a surface-level -- I think that, look, if you are employing people and treating them poorly, if you're employing people in your home and not also agitating for broader worker protections for them, I think if you are devaluing the work that people are providing for you in your home or care-giving work, definitely. Like put you in the feminist tribunal and indict you. But just because you are someone who is participating in this economy does not mean there is no way to do it ethically and does not mean you cannot have participation in this political movement.
Aminatou: Right. And it also doesn't mean that there's no dignity in working as a domestic worker, you know what I mean?
Ann: 100%.
Aminatou: Like women of color have been taking care of the children of white women for a very long time. Read a fucking book Caitlin Flanagan.
Ann: So I mean I literally cited an article from 20 years ago so . . . [Laughs]
Aminatou: I know! You've riled me up because I remembered it and here's the headline: How Serfdom Saved the Women's Movement, Dispatches from the Nanny's World.
Ann: Argh!
Aminatou: 2004 was such a weird time. It was such a weird time. Anyway let's -- I'm dying to hear you talk to Ai-jen Poo, shero for life.
Ann: Yes.
[Interview Starts]
Ann: Thank you so much for being on the podcast today.
Ai-jen: Thanks so much for having me.
(13:52)
Ann: I want to start with just kind of getting on the same page definition-wise. When you use the term domestic work what are we talking about and who are we talking about?
Ai-jen: We're basically talking about anybody who works in someone else's home doing cleaning or care-giving. So that's house cleaners, it's nannies, it's home care workers who take care of the elderly or support people with disabilities. That whole workforce that does the work that makes everything else possible, making it possible for us to go out into the world and do what we do every day, but is hidden behind the closed doors of our private homes. And it's more than 90% women, disproportionately women of color, black and immigrant women, and it's the fastest-growing occupation in our entire economy. In fact home care workers who take care of the elderly in the private home are the single fastest-growing occupation in our entire workforce because the need for care is so great.
Ann: And I have my own feminist guesses but why are these professions so disproportionately women and women of color?
Ai-jen: Well I would say that this work of care-giving and cleaning, family care, doing the kind of invisible, unrecognized work that makes everything else possible has historically been associated with women, really kind of seen as women's work, and then as a profession really associated with women of marginalized social status: black women under slavery and immigrant women throughout history, Native women. So as a profession it's really been racialized in such a way where it's the kind of least-visible, most-vulnerable women in our economy really occupying this work.
Ann: Talk about some of the challenges that you've faced in organizing workers in domestic professions.
(15:55)
Ai-jen: Well what's so interesting is that I mean if you think about it you could go into any neighborhood or apartment building and not know which homes are also somebody's workplace, right? There's no registry. There's no list anywhere. It's not like you go around the neighborhood and there's a sign that says somebody works here. Not at all. In a lot of cases you're really the only person that knows that you work there. If you think about a house cleaner that cleans for ten different houses does her family even know all the different houses that she works at? I'm not sure, right?
So there's just a level of invisibility and disaggregation where just workers are everywhere and nowhere at the same time. And then there's this really long history that a lot of people don't know about where when our nation's labor laws were put into place including the really foundational pieces of the National Labor Relations Act which gave workers the right to organize and collectively bargain and the Fair Labor Standards Act which established a minimum wage, those two core pillars of our labor laws explicitly exclude domestic workers and farm workers who at the time these laws were passed were mostly black women, black workers. And southern members of Congress refused to support these labor laws if domestic workers and farm workers were included. So to this day a lot of those exclusions remain in our labor laws.
So a lot of stuff that you and I take for granted when we go to work every day, domestic workers have never been protected. And so there's just between the isolation and the disaggregation and the invisibility and this historic and repeated structural exclusion from actual protections, it just makes for a really interesting organizing challenge for sure. [Laughs]
(18:00)
Ann: God, yeah. And it's something that I've been thinking about as there continues to be a growing conversation about what are sometimes called 1099 workers or temp workers or people who work doing the service end of a lot of really profitable startup companies, right? And what's really interesting to me is watching sometimes how those things are framed as like "new trend" and then I think about this work that you're doing and the history you described and it's like actually maybe the demo or the type of framing has changed but this is not like oh, we're suddenly in a new era of people who are not enjoying what we like to think are fundamental labor protections.
Ai-jen: Right, no. It's such a good observation. We call domestic workers the original gig economy workers for this very reason.
Ann: Yes.
Ai-jen: I mean basically when I first started organizing domestic workers in the 1990s it was kind of seen as this interesting and exotic thing where there are these workers kind of working at the margins of the economy and like ooh, what's going on in the shadows? And today when I look around the conditions that define domestic work are long hours, low wages, unpredictable hours, lack of control over your hours, lack of access to any kind of benefits or a safety net, lack of job security, lack of career pathways, right? Those characteristics or qualities that define domestic work increasingly define work for more and more American workers. Like this is what's become the future of work for so many and the so-called non-traditional or informal, right? There are all these words that economists have used to talk about this work. It's more and more the norm.
(19:52)
And so we do believe that domestic work and domestic workers and our movement, we have a lot to teach workers in 21st century America as a whole about how we change and how we shape the future of work in a way that actually works for everyone.
Ann: Right. To that end I would love to hear you talk a bit about the Domestic Workers' Bill of Rights or things that you're looking at that address these fundamental issues faced by domestic workers but that are also shared as you point out by this maybe newer wave of gig economy workers too.
Ai-jen: So we started out and we were like how do we make these jobs better jobs? And how do we stop some of the abuses that happen? And we compare the domestic work industry sometimes to the wild west because you never really know what you're going to get. You might find an amazing family who you stay with for generations, like you take care of their kids and their grand kids. There are stories like that where the relationship is incredibly healthy and respectful and one of real value for everyone involved. And then there's these stories of human trafficking and modern-day slavery and stories like I worked on a case where a young woman who was recruited to be a nanny, a live-in nanny, worked for a family for 15 years and never got paid. So stories like that, right? And rape and sexual assault.
Ann: Yeah.
Ai-jen: And then everything in-between. So there's no standards. There's not really guidelines. It's kind of just what individual households kind of decide and so we kind of set out to say you know what? There really should be standards. This is a profession and it's dignified work. It's important work. We bring value to the families that we work for. How do we actually establish some standards and get on a path to making these jobs really good jobs? And that's when we realized all the exclusions and the protections under the law and we said the first step has to be establishing some basic fundamental protections so that we can actually assert some rights. Like give us some rights so we can assert them. [Laughs]
Ann: Right.
(22:08)
Ai-jen: And that's what led to the creation of the Domestic Worker Bill of Rights, and New York was the first state in the country where we launched an effort to get the state of New York to really be the first state to say this work is dignified work. It deserves real protections and these are the rights that this workforce deserves. And it took seven years to pass the first domestic worker . . . [Laughs]
Ann: Oh, is that all?
Ai-jen: Year after year we would go up to Albany and push, the workers thousands of them just year after year telling their stories, marching, protesting, and also just building support, building coalitions, building relationships, building awareness. And in 2010 New York became the first state to pass a bill of rights and now today we have eight states total that have passed domestic worker bills and we're about to -- breaking news -- introduce a federal domestic worker bill of rights to cover every single domestic worker in the country this fall. So we're really excited about that.
Ann: Ugh, I love hearing about positive things happening at the federal level. I'm like yes.
Ai-jen: Totally.
Ann: So rare these days I feel like. Talk a little bit about what that means in practice because when I hear that I'm like yes, that kind of guarantees under the law a baseline but when you're talking about people who work for families and individuals, not like businesses who are worried about being on the legal up-and-up, it seems like it might present some enforcement challenges as well.
Ai-jen: Oh yeah, there's a lot of challenges. And I would say that that's one of the main reasons that we as a movement have said actually establishing minimum standards and protections is not enough. One, we have a major enforcement challenge which is really about how we change this culture to really recognize that this work is -- these are professionals. This is work that is incredibly necessary and it's one of the few jobs that can't be outsourced and won't be automated, at least any time soon.
Ann: Right, it's growing.
(24:20)
Ai-jen: Right. These are the jobs of the future. We've got to make them good jobs. And establishing minimum standards alone does not make good jobs, right? It does not get us to a living wage with benefits and real economic mobility. So that's where we've decided that we have to pair our policy strategy with real innovation and big vision, big ideas about how we actually invest in the care economy in a totally revolutionary way.
So we've got two kind of parallel tracks. One is developing the kinds of innovations from our movement, from workers that leverage new technology, leverage partnerships with companies who are values-aligned to say how do we work together to make these jobs good jobs for the 21st century? And one example of that is we're launching a product called Alia which is a portable benefits product for house cleaners. It's the first app of its kind that actually allows for a low-wage workforce to get access to benefits. And for house cleaners who are often independent contractors, often working for like ten or twelve families, right, they've never had access to a safety net of benefits before. So it's a huge innovation there and basically if you hire a house cleaner you can contribute a little additional fee on top of the cleaning fee that goes straight into her benefits account and she can get contributions from all of her different employers into this benefits account. That account, she then gets to decide where she wants to apply the money in the account towards. So she could put it towards life insurance or paid time off, right? And it provides economic resilience that before low-wage workers just would not, in this kind of non-traditional workforce, could not get access to.
(26:20)
So there's that kind of innovation that we're trying and then the other big piece is how do we revolutionize the way that we invest in the care economy? Because at the end of the day everybody's struggling to pay the bills and paying a living wage with benefits to your house cleaner or your nanny or your home care worker is not viable for a lot of people who are barely making it, right? And so we have to figure out as a society how we make really great care affordable and accessible without having to force the workforce to live in poverty. And that means a whole new approach to care which is about really seeing it as infrastructure.
And our big idea which is kind of like universal basic income is this idea that in the future there should be one fund that we all contribute to, that we can all benefit from, that helps us afford childcare, elder care, and paid family leave. Basically everything we need as we're working to take care of our families. And because the needs are so variant across different families, across different environments, having one pooled fund like that, a social insurance fund like that, allows for that flexibility and accounts for all the different types of scenarios that people are going through. So we think as we're moving towards investments in the care economy and a big-vision idea like universal family care that we should also be imagining how are we also innovating today and setting the groundwork for that kind of revolution in our care economy?
[Music and Ads]
(31:10)
Ann: I have been also thinking while listening to you talk about both this and the app how much of this is also cultural. I mean obviously this is a concrete policy recommendation, like a really ambitious one, but also so much of this is how do we as a culture feel about what is valuable labor? Like how do we as a culture decide what is worth talking about in the open, or what is a thing that just happens and we don't talk about? And so maybe you can talk a little bit about the culture piece of it too because I think about that -- I mean we're a podcast. We are not doing like, you know, this kind of policy work in the field. We're more of a culture operation over here. So I would love your thoughts on that as well.
(31:50)
Ai-jen: Yeah. I think this is hugely about culture and in a lot of ways culture change precedes policy change in a lot of contexts. And so I definitely think that this is about how we have culturally undervalued care and care-giving. I think about Gloria Steinem has this awesome article that she wrote back in the '70s or '80s in her book Moving Beyond Words and she talks about the two kind of natural resources that fundamentally power everything else in our economy. And it's basically the work that goes into care-giving and raising families and the planet's natural resources, right? These two invisible, under-recognized, taken for granted life forces that make everything else possible and we've been told that they've been made invisible by intention, right?
And what we have to do in the future is fundamentally revalue those two natural resources if we are going to have a sustainable economy. I think it's because this work has been associated with women and as a profession with women of color and because we have a cultural hierarchy that almost is like a hierarchy of human value where we value some lives and some contributions more than others and domestic work and care work is the embodiment of the things that we value least even if they are the most important to us, and so there has to be almost like a revolution in our cultural valuing and what matters most in our economy but also in our families and in our lives. And once those things align I think so much is possible. So much human potential gets unleashed. That is exactly what we're trying to catalyze in our work.
(34:05)
Ann: Yeah, and I'm wondering if you have some concrete advice about that. I mean it's one thing to say oh, in my heart of hearts and in my brain I understand that care-giving is this huge, powerful, and necessary force, right? Aside from what I might've heard about how it's valued or the messages I might've received, this is how I feel. And it's another to kind of enact that as a way of being in the world. And I'm wondering if you have thoughts for people who are allied with, who are friends with domestic workers, people who employ domestic workers, about things that are not just thinking this is valuable work but things that are more doing too.
Ai-jen: Mm-hmm, absolutely. I mean one of the things that is so interesting is that care-giving as an experience is something that's really unifying. I think Roslyn Carter once said it but there's only four kinds of people in the world: people who are caregivers or will be caregivers and people who need care or will need care. And usually we're more than one of those identities at any given moment but we don't see ourselves that way partly because of the way that we've devalued this work and these relationships culturally.
And so part of it is just making those relationships visible and that part of the human experience much more visible and much more part of our public discourse. So an example is everything from I remember in the Time 100 when Amy Poehler was in the Time 100 and sometimes they give these toasts at that fancy dinner that happens every year. I watched it on YouTube. It was the most exhilarating thing for us because at the time no one was really talking about domestic workers and she chose to toast her two nannies who were at home with her children so she could do her work every day but really also be honored at the Time 100. And so she paid tribute to her nannies. In her moment in the sun she chose to share it with these women who are enabling her work.
(36:12)
And there are so many ways big and small that we can recognize those care-giving relationships and the people who are doing this work in our homes that's so valuable. It's everything from actually recognizing it to them to finding more public ways and also more material ways, right? One thing in terms of practices, there's a great resource and organization called Hand-in-Hand which offers all kinds of resources for people who hire caregivers or house cleaners in their home, how to have the conversation about the work agreement, how to talk about time off or what's fair and all those things. They're a great resource for that so I would recommend if you're employing someone to go to that website domesticemployers.org. There's concrete things and also just like how do we tell the story of how we rely upon each other as caregivers and people who need support and make that a much more visible part of our daily lives.
Ann: Yeah. And to that end I'm really curious about your life and whether and how domestic work has shaped it or supports it.
Ai-jen: Well one thing that I've been thinking about a lot lately is because my grandmother is my personal hero. She's 93 I believe and she lives in Alhambra, California so very far away from me. But she really played a huge role in raising me. She potty trained me which was pretty important. She taught me my values. You know, when I learned to speak I was with her. So she just has played such a huge role in my life and she now -- we're very fortunate because she's supported by two home care workers who allow her to live in her apartment that she shared with my grandfather for 20 years before he passed away. So she's still able to be independent. She's still able to have a quality of life where she's able to interact with friends and go to church twice a week and play Mahjong and do things on her terms because of the work of Mrs. Lee and Mrs. Sun who support her 24/7 because she needs more and more assistance these days. She actually had a mini stroke last week.
Ann: Oh, I'm sorry.
(38:50)
Ai-jen: She's actually recovering from it in this miraculous way which I think is -- I believe has everything to do with the care and support that she has around her but, you know, moments like that where you just realize these people who are so important to you and the space of home which is like our kind of sanctuaries in life, we count on others to help us maintain those relationships and maintain something a important as like a dignified quality of life for your grandmother. And so it's just a constant reminder especially now just thinking about her, like thank god that she has that support. And every single one of us deserves that.
Ann: Completely. And also just a sign of how the feeling that you have toward your loved one who is being cared for is a feeling that should by all rights extend to the person doing the caring, right? It's like such a symbiotic relationship. That's so beautiful.
(39:50)
Ai-jen: Absolutely. And I think increasingly, you know, with the demographic changes when we actually think about what's happening in this country every eight seconds somebody turns 65 in America.
Ann: Oh my god.
Ai-jen: The baby boom generation is aging. It's like 10,000 people per day, four million people per year turn 65. And because of advances in technology and medicine people are living longer than we ever imagined when we put our safety net in place. And then millennials on the other end of the generational spectrum are also starting to have families of their own and having four million babies per year. So on both ends of the generational spectrum in our country there's a huge increase in the need for care and we are actually at a point where we have less of it than ever before because we used to just say some woman would stay home and do that work. Women are essentially our default care infrastructure and that just hasn't been the case for decades now and nothing has been put in place to account for that work. We're in a moment where it's kind of the caring reality of this country is like an all hands on deck situation so we're going to all be caring for each other and caring for our family members and we're going to need a really strong care-giving workforce that is sustainable and professional and dignified if we're going to meet the challenge of the 21st century family life in this country.
Ann: Ai-jen Poo thank you so much for being on the show.
Ai-jen: Thanks for having me.
[Interview Ends]
Ann: Oh my god, is she not the best?
Aminatou: Ann! I love labor organizers. Hug your labor organizer friends tight and thank you for all of your work. Ai-jen Poo's amazing.
Ann: Yeah, and also I hope that this episode is something you can send to a friend who is feeling conflicted about employing someone in their home and be like look, that's not a thing to be conflicted about; you just need to do it ethically or you need to sort of approach this from an angle of solidarity as well. And I think she is so great at explaining the kind of 101 of this very complicated work that she does so shout-out to Ai-jen forever and ever.
Aminatou: Ugh, forever. Good job MacArthur Genius Foundation. [Laughter]
Ann: Oh! You know what? It is not . . .
Aminatou: Also it's called the MacArthur Foundation, not the MacArthur Genius Foundation, but I'm going to start calling it the MacArthur Genius . . .
Ann: That's going to be your rival foundation where you're like "I'm sorry, copyright dispute." [Laughter] So you can find out more about the National Domestic Workers' Alliance and all of the many things that Ai-jen talked about at domesticworkers.org.
Aminatou: Whew.
Ann: And I'll see you on the Internet and in our homes and in the fight for fair labor practices.
Aminatou: Ugh, see you so soon boo-boo. You can find us many places on the Internet, on our website callyourgirlfriend.com. You can download the show anywhere you listen to your favs or on Apple Podcasts where we would love it if you left us a review. You can email us at callyrgf@gmail.com. We're on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook at @callyrgf. You can even leave us a short and sweet voicemail at 714-681-2943. That's 714-681-CYGF. Our theme song is by Robyn. Original music is composed by Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs. Our logos are by Kenesha Sneed. Our associate producer is Destry Maria Sibley. This podcast is produced by Gina Delvac.