Home health aides are one of the least happy careers in the United States.
At CareerExplorer, we conduct an ongoing survey with millions of people and ask them how satisfied they are with their careers. As it turns out, home health aides rate their career happiness 2.8 out of 5 stars which puts them in the bottom 17% of careers.
To put this into perspective, we compared how happy home health aides are to similar careers in the industry. Take a look at the results below:
Salaries and satisfaction ratings in similar careers
| Career | Satisfaction | Avg Salary |
|---|---|---|
| Ophthalmic medical technician | 2.9 | $37k |
| Psychiatric aide | 2.9 | $29k |
| Audiologist | 2.9 | $79k |
| Orthotist and prosthetist | 2.9 | $75k |
| Personal care aide | 2.8 | $26k |
| Home health aide | 2.8 | $22k |
| Psychiatric technician | 2.8 | $37k |
| Licensed practical nurse | 2.8 | $48k |
| Pharmacy technician | 2.8 | $37k |
| Medical administrative assistant | 2.8 | $37k |
So what does it mean to be happy in your career? Let’s break it down into different dimensions:
- Salary: Are home health aides happy with their salary?
- Meaning: Do home health aides find their jobs meaningful?
- Personality fit: How well suited are people’s personalities to their everyday tasks as home health aides?
- Work environment: How enjoyable are home health aide’s work environments?
- Skills utilization: Are home health aides making the best use of their abilities?
Are home health aides happy with their salary?
Home health aides rated their satisfaction with their salaries 2.5/5. Most home health aides do not feel that their salaries adequately reflect their work, and are actively unhappy with their income.
We asked home health aides how fairly compensated they are for their work.
Their response was:
2.5 out of 5 stars
964 home health aides
7% of home health aides rated their compensation 5 stars
15% of home health aides rated their compensation 4 stars
25% of home health aides rated their compensation 3 stars
27% of home health aides rated their compensation 2 stars
26% of home health aides rated their compensation 1 stars
Do home health aides find their jobs meaningful?
On average, home health aides rate the meaningfulness of their work a 3.2/5. Most tend to be satisified with the level of meaning they find in their careers.
We asked home health aides how meaningful they found their work.
Their response was:
3.2 out of 5 stars
965 home health aides
20% of home health aides rated how meaningful they found their career 5 stars
28% of home health aides rated how meaningful they found their career 4 stars
23% of home health aides rated how meaningful they found their career 3 stars
14% of home health aides rated how meaningful they found their career 2 stars
15% of home health aides rated how meaningful they found their career 1 stars
How well are people’s personalities suited to everyday tasks as home health aides?
Home health aides rated their personality fit with their work an average of 3.8/5. The majority of home health aides find their personalities quite well suited to their work, with relatively few having complaints about their fit.
We asked home health aides how well their personalities fit into their careers.
Their response was:
3.8 out of 5 stars
1018 home health aides
33% of home health aides rated their career fit 5 stars
33% of home health aides rated their career fit 4 stars
19% of home health aides rated their career fit 3 stars
8% of home health aides rated their career fit 2 stars
7% of home health aides rated their career fit 1 stars
How enjoyable is a home health aide’s work environment?
As a whole, home health aides rated their enjoyment of their work environment 3.2/5. Most of them tend to enjoy, or at least not be actively bothered by, their work environment.
We asked home health aides how much they enjoyed their work environment.
Their response was:
3.2 out of 5 stars
1020 home health aides
18% of home health aides rated their work environment 5 stars
27% of home health aides rated their work environment 4 stars
26% of home health aides rated their work environment 3 stars
18% of home health aides rated their work environment 2 stars
11% of home health aides rated their work environment 1 stars
Are home health aides making the best use of their abilities?
Former home health aides on CareerExplorer have rated their skills utilization 2.8/5. Home health aides tend to feel that they don’t manage to use their abilities to their fullest, when compared to other careers.
We asked home health aides how well their abilities were used in their careers.
Their response was:
2.8 out of 5 stars
1019 home health aides
14% of home health aides rated their how well their skills were utilized in their career 5 stars
18% of home health aides rated their how well their skills were utilized in their career 4 stars
23% of home health aides rated their how well their skills were utilized in their career 3 stars
23% of home health aides rated their how well their skills were utilized in their career 2 stars
21% of home health aides rated their how well their skills were utilized in their career 1 stars