Working 9 to 5 to 9

Chinese home care workers in New York City are fighting to end an exploitative labor practice known as the 24-hour rule, where they are only paid for 13 out of 24 hours worked. However, they face resistance from officials and non-profits, and insufficient union support.

Producers Aria Young and Leina Gabra take us inside the reality of 24-hour work and why it has been so difficult to change this policy.

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Chinese Home Care Workers Fight to End 24-hour Workday

In New York, round-the-clock home care could mean never-ending work for immigrant workers like Zhū Nü Jùn. Zhū, a 70-year-old recently retired Chinese worker in Brooklyn, says she is injured for life after eight years of being a home attendant. No matter how strong she used to be, Zhū now struggles to perform daily tasks like brushing her teeth without pain in her right hand — one of the lasting effects of her various work injuries.

Until 2024, Zhū worked 24-hour shifts as a home attendant while only being compensated for 13 hours — a unique labor practice in New York that workers claim to be exploitative and inhumane. While the law permits 24-hour work under the condition that the worker gets three hours of meal time and eight hours of rest (five of which must be uninterrupted), Zhū and other workers claim the required working conditions, known as the “13-hour rule,” are nearly impossible to enforce. 

There are over 3.6 million home care aides in the United States. These workers provide essential care and support for the elderly and people with disabilities. Despite the country’s growing need for home care workers, it remains one of the lowest-paid jobs in healthcare. New York City has the highest concentration of home care aides in the entire country. More than two-thirds of these workers are immigrants, and the majority are women of color. In the city’s Chinese American community, immigrant workers like Zhū provide integral services to Chinese-speaking seniors. 

The Chinese-American Planning Council’s Home Attendant Program (CPCHAP) serves thousands of care receivers around New York City, particularly those who are Chinese American or Chinese immigrants. Although the Chinese-American Planning Council (CPC) provides many essential social services besides home care, it has been the recipient of many of the home care workers’ protests and claims of exploitation. 

“The [CPC] still continue to practice 24-hour workdays and exploit us Asian women,” said Zhū Nü Jùn in Chinese. “That’s why we are uniting to resist and force them to correct the 24-hour workday. If they don’t change, we will persist in protesting at their doorstep.”

For years, a group of Chinese home care workers have been organizing against CPC’s alleged institutional oppression. However, the workers have faced many systemic roadblocks in putting an end to the 24-hour workday.

Lack of Union Support

In New York, unionized home care workers are members of 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East, the largest healthcare union in the country. Since home care workers started organizing to end the 24-hour work day, they have asked 1199SEIU for support, but time and time again, they say the union has fallen short of their expectations. 

“We protested against Union 1199 in 2022,” said Zhū. “Demanding the union to stand up and help us workers speak out, demand our justice.”

In 2019, 1199 filed a class-action lawsuit against 42 home care agencies in New York on behalf of their workers, including CPCHAP. The union accused these employers of violating their “CBAs and state and federal wage and hour laws” by not paying overtime and travel time wages owed to workers. And in February 2022, it won the case. 

Although this seemed like a turning point, workers were disappointed to find out from the arbitrated ruling that employers would distribute $30-40 million to about 57,000 of their current and former employees. This money was not distributed equally; it came out to an average of about $525-700 per worker — a far cry from what workers estimate they are owed.

“This is by far the largest recoupment of lost wages to date, far surpassing the minimal amounts that non-union workers have been able to achieve through class action lawsuits against employers,” said Rose Ryan, Press Secretary of 1199SEIU, in a written statement to Feet in 2 Worlds, also stating that the union “fully supports the right of home care workers to be paid for every hour they are required to be in consumers’ homes.”

Deflected Government Accountability

Home care workers have been ringing the alarm to gain the attention and support of New York City and State politicians. At the city level, a group of 14 council members, with Council Member Chris Marte at the helm, has sponsored a bill to end the 24-hour workday. 

However, Marte and his co-sponsors have introduced new versions of this bill several times over the years to no avail. In part, this is because opponents of the bill argue that 24-hour work can only be eliminated by the state and not the city, because home care is subsidized by Medicaid at the state level. On the other hand, proponents of the bill say that outlawing 24-hour home care shifts in the city would not affect Medicaid, and might even pressure the state to enact a similar bill. 

The heated and protracted debate over this bill has led to years of delay in any meaningful legislation. A possible reason for all this deflection could be how much splitting shifts may cost. In 2022, the state estimated that the move from 24-hour shifts to two 12-hour shifts would cost about a billion dollars — a small fraction compared to New York state’s 2025 budget of $237 billion. 

Outsourced Responsibility to Non-Profits

The issue of labor exploitation may go much further beyond the 24-hour shift, according to state assembly member Ron Kim, a long-time advocate for home care workers. Kim suggests that the responsibility of providing essential services perhaps should not fall on non-profits such as the CPC.

“When you go to mostly suburban white neighborhoods, it’s not the non-profits that are out there cutting ribbons. It’s the county governments that are treating their constituents with the services that they get,” said Kim. “So why is it that when it’s immigrants, Blacks, and minorities, we’re left with these non-profit neighborhoods?”

In a “non-profit neighborhood”— often an urban area with a higher proportion of minority residents — services that are usually provided by the government, such as healthcare, education, and even parks, are instead managed by local non-profits. By outsourcing these essential services, the government may avoid direct responsibility for any negative results.

Non-profit neighborhoods in New York City have cemented themselves over decades, and the organizations within them support thousands of people. Holding these institutions accountable could potentially threaten crucial resources for the community. The solution, as Kim suggests, that the government should be the one to provide services instead of nonprofits, is easier said than done.

The Future of New York Home Care 

While the workers continue to organize to end the 24-hour workday, the future of home care in New York State may be headed in a new direction. In September 2024, a private equity firm, Public Partnerships LLC, or PPL, was awarded a government contract to manage the state’s home care finances. That means they’ll be the ones sending workers their paychecks. 

PPL has already been criticized in other states like Colorado, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Oregon for being unresponsive and delaying payment to workers. Despite public pushback, the Hochul administration forges ahead, denying that the PPL’s involvement in home care will affect caregivers or receivers. 

“This is not just about the workers. This is about better care for not only disabled communities, for older adults and anyone who deserves that care,” said Rep. Ron Kim.

Zhū, after retiring last year with multiple work-related injuries and illnesses, now needs a home attendant herself. While she stays resilient in her fight to create a better tomorrow for immigrant workers, the question remains — what lies in the future of home care?

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Credits

Hosted by Shaka Tafari

Produced by Leina Gabra and Aria Young

Edited by Lushik Lotus-Lee

Additional editing by Mia Warren and Quincy Surasmith

Fact Checking by Julie Schwietert Collazo

Engineering by Iggy Monda and Jocelyn Gonzales

Original theme music by Gautam Srikishan

Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions

“The Hustle” show logo by Daniel Robles

Feet in 2 Worlds is supported by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, The Ford Foundation, the Fernandez Pave the Way Foundation, an anonymous donor, and contributors to our annual NewsMatch campaign.