Human services sector growing but wages stay stagnant

CUNY reports finds wages grew 3 percent since 2000

Workers in the human service industry would need to make $20,000 more a year in order to earn a living wage, according to a recent report.

The number of New Yorkers working in the sector has nearly doubled in the last 25 years. The percentage of workers employed in human services across the state has grown from 7 percent to 12 percent, with nearly one million people working in the field. Much of this growth was attributed to the expansion of the home health care industry, which grew 406 percent between 2000 and 2023.