Healthcare becoming the top employer

Healthcare organizations are becoming the top employers in large cities and rural communities, The Los Angeles Times reported.

Despite the nation's economic slump, healthcare organizations have benefited local economies by revitalizing neighborhoods and bringing in more job opportunities, according to the article.

For example, in Detroit, Beaumont Health System has replaced General Motors as the region's top employer. Moreover, a March report by the Michigan Health & Hospital Association found that healthcare was the biggest private-sector employer statewide in 2010, the most recent year for which data was available, FierceHealthFinance previously reported.

Similarly, healthcare organizations serve as "economic anchors in Kansas, attracting and maintaining business, as well as creating jobs, according to a report released last month from the state hospital association. Hospitals in particular generate $6.3 billion for the state's income across all industries.

Without these major healthcare employers, the U.S. unemployment rate would be 9.8 percent rather than 8.1 percent, noted the LA Times.

However, healthcare employers haven’t improved wage gaps or job quality. Home health aides and personal-care aides, which are expected to see the biggest boom over the next 10 years, make only $10 an hour, according to the article. Specialty physicians like pediatricians, on the other hand, earn $156,000 a year.

To learn more:
- read the LA Times article