Care work is the work that makes all other work possible. It is the invisible foundation of our economy–some may even call it invisible labor. The devaluation of this work can be traced to a known history of racially exclusionary and patriarchal structures that framed caregiving as the unpaid, expected labor of women, particularly women of color. The perception of care as “free” labor has created a modern-day crisis: suppressed wages, an unaffordable and patchwork system of services, and profound economic instability for the millions—disproportionately Black, Brown, and immigrant women—who perform this essential work. According to a 2025 report by Caregiving in the US, roughly one in four American adults is a family caregiver, and women account for the majority of those (61%). And as many organizations in the industry have speculated, family caregivers of adults aged 18+ has risen from 39.8 million in 2015 to 59 million in 2025.
Breaking this vicious cycle and rendering ourselves ready to meet this moment requires a fundamental reimagining of care, not as a private burden, but as a public good worthy of collective investment. And beyond being a public good, an acknowledgement by all members of society that a shift toward conscious and remunerated caretaking is essential in a civil society. This is the task that Caring Across Generations has undertaken since its founding in 2011. The organization operates on a powerful, three-pillared strategy to transform both policy and culture: building power among the “Caring Majority (the vast majority of people who already or will give or receive care at some point in their lives), winning state and federal policy changes, and fundamentally shifting the narratives that have rendered care invisible.
Metta Fund had the opportunity to speak with CAG’s CPO, Nicole Jorwic, who’s been with the organization for four years. “Culture change and narrative change work drew me to this organization,” she says. From a personal perspective, Ms. Jorwic brings lived experience as a family caregiver to her work while she oversees everything from advocacy, digital communications, and culture and narrative change work at Caring Across.
At the heart of CAG’s work is the understanding that care is a universal human experience. Nearly everyone will give or receive care at some point in their lives. This vast, often untapped network is the “Caring Majority,” as CAG has coined it, and mobilizing it is key to creating change.
The primary vehicle for this is the Care Can’t Wait Coalition, a national initiative with thriving state coalitions in California and other states across the nation. This initiative, “rooted in coalition work…breaks down otherwise siloed conversations at a state and national level” between advocacy groups focused on childcare, paid leave, aging, and disability, and changes the effort “from a scarcity mindset to one of abundance” and collaboration, says Ms. Jorwic. By uniting over these organizations, including the National Domestic Workers Alliance and MomsRising, Care Can’t Wait creates a powerful, unified front.
“So many of us caretakers are up searching for answers in the middle of the night,” says Ms. Jorwic.
“The best support we can provide caregivers are organized systems, information, snippets, and breaking down policy” that affects them. “I’m passionate about translating info like Medicaid news into plain language,” she says. “We do this through policy translation and through our care fellowship program,” which helps caregivers become their own translators and therefore the empowered, transformation agents of their own caretaking stories.
The Care Fellowship, launched in 2019 by CAG, is a leadership development program that trains and equips caregivers to become leaders in the national movement for equitable care. Each year, a cohort of about 100 fellows undergoes a four-month program focused on developing skills in advocacy, organizing, and leadership. A key component is building a supportive community to combat isolation and provide respite from the sometimes emotionally and physically draining work. The program has an alumni network of over 400 caregivers that continues to receive ongoing support, enabling fellows to champion care solutions and build power within their local communities and the broader national movement.
“I didn’t identify as a caregiver until I started working at Caring Across,” Jorwic reveals, highlighting the isolation many feel. “That’s an important piece—we give people language and community when it comes to caregiving.”
This work is guided by a principle of interdependence. “We need systems of support,” says Ms. Jorwic. These fellowship trainings along with “our state partnerships and national coalition partners are focusing on holding that whole system of support because that directly ties into what we want to see for the whole societal care ecosystem,” she says.
Family caregivers rely heavily on a paid workforce, but CAG reminds us that we have to remember the needs and desires of all those involved. Focusing on a holistic approach ensures that solutions lift up the needs of care recipients, family caregivers, and the professional care workforce simultaneously.
This unified front is essential for building the political power required to win transformative policy changes. Caring Across advocates for a comprehensive care infrastructure that includes universal long-term services and supports for the aging and disability communities, affordable childcare, and paid family and medical leave for all. In a time of unimaginable social safety net cuts, this work feels downright radical, but it is the vision work that CAG is focused on into the next 20 and 30 years.
CAG’s policy team works at both state and national levels, remaining agile to both defend against cuts and advance new investments. In 2025, a key focus is protecting Medicaid from devastating budget cuts that would harm millions who rely on it for home and community-based care. CAG is also working to redefine the conversation around public spending, positioning care infrastructure as a wise economic investment, especially as trillions of dollars in tax cuts are set to expire.
Understanding this information is difficult for the average person, not to mention elders or disabled elders, or those who speak other languages looking to the administration to share this news in a variety of ways, including native languages outside of English. Caring Across knows that making this information understood to the caregiving whole involves extensive public education, providing toolkits to partners, and conducting research to demonstrate the cost and return of care systems. By winning policy battles at the state level and shifting the narrative on federal investment, Caring Across is laser-focused on laying the groundwork for the universal, equitable care system of the future.
These narrative and societal changes that CAG envisions for the future will take time, but Ms. Jorwic and her team have their North Star mapped out. In ten years, the primary goal will be to “have the policies and systems in place for people to be able to make that care choice,” she says. “Right now, it’s just a fact of life that we don’t have that option, but regardless of who needs care, caretakers need support…and we would love to see a system where everyone has that support from a policy standpoint, so that every person has access to paid leave; aging and disability care is not something we think you need should impoverish you!” And in order to get there, she says, “we also need those narrative shifts, we need more people to start seeing themselves as part of the caregiver movement,” because it is “a mirror,” she says.
Moving into the organization’s 20-and-30-year vision, Caring Across envisions the nation being “on the precipice of a new New Deal where care is at the center,” where a reordering of national priorities with a publicly-supported care economy becomes a central pillar of American society. Caring Across’s long-term goal is a complete cultural and systemic shift where care is fully recognized as a collective responsibility and a benefit to society. The vision is a society that has moved beyond isolated, crisis-driven care to one where the collective need to solve these problems is universally accepted, and the systems are in place to provide support for everyone, regardless of their circumstances. They believe it is possible, and momentum is growing, not just with cohorts of caretakers, but into highly influential sectors.
Perhaps the most visionary element of Caring Across’ work is its deep investment in culture change. The team and its broader community recognize that deeply ingrained cultural norms—that care is an individual’s responsibility, not a collective one—are a major barrier to policy progress. To transform these narratives, Caring Across has also become an unlikely but highly influential force in Hollywood and beyond.
“We’ve worked a lot with Hollywood… representation truly does matter,” says Jorwic. “Ultimately, it’s about getting those stories into scripts and onto the screen, so that when we are seeing care, it’s realistic and reflected in a real way—not just as a burden, but also as a joy.”
The Creative Care Council is a cohort of high-profile artists and entertainers, primarily in Hollywood, who use their platforms to amplify care stories. This gave way to The Care Inclusion Playbook, which is an accessible but groundbreaking resource for screenwriters and creators to develop more authentic and inclusive care storylines. This has led to consultations with major studios like Netflix, Apple, and ABC. Looking ahead, the organization plans to extend this narrative work into the world of professional sports and launch the first-ever care-focused film festival, ensuring the message of interdependence reaches new, diverse audiences.
Heading into the new year, CAG is planning another ambitious effort: a national Care Consultation. This initiative aims to engage in deep listening with one million people, including those not yet part of the movement, to identify common problems and co-create solutions.
“We’ll be doing this with our Can’t Wait coalition and also people we haven’t coalesced with yet,” says Ms. Jorwic. “Our big goal is to make sure those millions of conversations also break on through to people who haven’t heard of our organization yet. From there, we’ll synthesize these findings, which will lead us to the policy solutions that lead us to the 20 and 30-year goals we have envisioned,” she says.
Weaving together the threads of grassroots power, bold policy vision work, education and empowerment, and embedded and native storytelling, Caring Across Generations is orchestrating a cultural and political shift to create a future where care is accessible, affordable, and equitable. This will require all of us, in it together, for all of us.
“Ultimately, our goal is to have the policies and systems in place to make care a choice. Right now, it’s a crisis,” Ms. Jorwic states. “Most people do have a care story,” says Ms. Jorwic.
What’s yours? Or what might it become?