My wife worked as a PSW in long term care for years. Trust me, proton. She was anything but overpaid. You could not do the work that she was required to do on a daily basis. Very few of us could.

There are generally three types of people who get into that line of work.. One, new immigrants who have limited job opportunities. This is a job that not many people would consider doing. No one wants to wipe old people's butts, clean up vomit, give old people baths, change colostomy bags, and a hundred other things that most people reading this would consider beneath them, or demeaning. Therefore, it is left to the new immigrant class in a lot of cases.

The second type of person is the "I don't give a crap" type, who come in, do a bad job, collect their pay cheque and complain about everything. They do not care about the residents, they don't look after them well, and are the ones who abuse the residents and get away with it. They should be fired, but rarely are, most times because of the union. These types know the union rules very well and play them.

The third type of person is what my wife is. Those are the ones who genuinely care for the residents, and do what ever they can to provide good, decent care. They are the true nurses, and if your elderly parents ever have to go into a long term care facility, you better pray to whatever god you consider holy that this is the type of person looking after your parents. Because odds are, it won't be. There just aren't that many of them. I will say here that many of the immigrants that I mentioned above also fall into this category.

Now, not every long term care facility is government run. Many are private. Some have unions, some don't. None are well paid. The facilities are there to make a profit, so the way they do this is to cut the front line staff to the bare minimum.

You see, everyone wants the best care for their elderly, but no one wants to pay for it. It's expensive. Very expensive. The problem is, a lot of the money doesn't go to the front line staff like it should. And therein lies the problem. The staff are poorly paid, because it's a dirty job and considered demeaning by most people.

My wife tells me stories of the sons and daughters of the residents who come to visit their parents at these facilities, and they act all snotty and are very rude to the PSWs. They order them around, berate them, complain that their parent isn't receiving enough care or attention, and are outright insulting.

So, anyone who thinks these front line workers are overpaid, lazy union bums with a fat pay cheque needs to re-evaluate their perspective.