Demand for social workers on the rise
 While salaries, working conditions on the decline

THE BUREAU OF LABOR Statistics (BLS) projects that demand for social workers will increase by 22 percent during the 2006-16 decade. Yet recruitment and retention problems plague the profession today.

Low salaries hinder recruitment and retention, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO). Heavy caseloads and related administrative burdens are other reasons social workers are leaving the profession.

While the GAO report was issued in March 2003 with the recommendation to Congress that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services step up its efforts to assist state and local agencies, working conditions appear to be unchanged.

"The biggest stress at this point is the high caseload," says Beth Earl, a foster care coordinator for Franklin County [Ohio] Children Services. "Workers are just overwhelmed with everything they have to do" from paperwork to meeting deadlines to addressing client needs with the county's limited financial resources, Earl adds.

Minimal raises over the past six years have created a situation where many of the children services workers have to work two jobs, including Earl, president of the Federation of Franklin County Children Services Employees, who has been delivering newspapers every morning for four years.

"I can't make enough to provide for my kids," she says. "I am certainly not in the minority of people who have second jobs here."

Earl's job, though, is her vocation. It's a profession steeped in history. According to the National Association of Social Workers, the first social work class was offered at Columbia University in New York City in 1898.

"I feel strongly about helping children and families," says Earl. "I don't think people come into the profession for the money but people should be able to provide for their own families when they have a college degree and a full-time job."

According the BLS, the nationwide median annual earnings of child, family and school social workers employed by local government was $43,500 in May 2006.