Help wanted: Demand for nurses growing as baby boomers retire, age
LI Herald
Keeping up with demand for highly skilled nurses has not been easy for many hospitals, though. Long-term shortages have plagued the profession in the past, according to a 2016 study by the Center for Health Workforce Studies at the State University of New York at Albany. Demand is expected to become increasingly acute in the coming decades.
The first baby boomers turned 65 in 2011, according to the Centers for Disease Control. The baby-boom generation, born between 1946 and 1963, was, until the millennials, the largest generation in U.S. history. As of 2014, there were some 76.4 million boomers, according to the census.
Never before has the U.S. seen such a large generation of people growing older. On top of that, exponential advances in medical technology are expected to keep boomers alive longer than previous generations.