The Great Healthcare Transition: Building the Workforce of Tomorrow

So, healthcare employers have two jobs to do at once. They have to replace the people who retire, and they have to add staff to care for more patients. Let’s look at how large that gap is, who can fill it, and what employers can do to keep the people they hire and train.

Healthcare has a succession problem

Succession means having someone ready to step in. Every organization needs a steady supply of new people to replace the ones who retire, move away, or change careers when an experienced worker leaves.

In healthcare, that supply has to be large. The BLS projects about 1.9 million openings in healthcare occupations each year from 2025 to 2035. Those openings come from new jobs and from the need to replace workers who leave their occupations for good.

Filling a position isn't the whole task. A medical assistant with 25 years in the same clinic knows the patients, the providers, and how the office runs. When that person retires, the clinic needs a replacement and also needs time for the replacement to learn what the retiree knew. Employers who wait until the retirement party to start hiring lose that overlap.

The workforce is aging

Nearly one in four healthcare workers is within about 10 years of the traditional retirement age or already past it. The federal government expects losses to show up as shortages. The Health Resources and Services Administration projects that by 2038 the country will be short 141,160 full-time physicians and 245,950 full-time licensed practical nurses (LPN). The LPN shortfall equals 30% of projected demand. The agency ties the gap to an aging workforce and an aging population, with more professionals retiring and others cutting back their hours.

Healthcare also has fewer young workers than most industries. Workers under 25 make up 9% of healthcare employment, compared with 12% of all U.S. employment, based on the same 2025 BLS data.

More older patients mean more demand

The 65-and-older population grew by 9 million people between 2020 and 2025, according to the Census Bureau. The working-age population, ages 18 to 64, grew by 2.4 million over the same period. The number of children fell by 1.8 million.

Put those numbers together, and the trend is clear. The group that uses the most care is growing almost four times faster than the group that provides it, and the group that will provide it in the future is shrinking.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics expects this to drive hiring for the next decade. In its 2025–35 employment projections, the agency projects that health care and social assistance will add more than 2.2 million jobs, about 37% of all new jobs in the country. It names the aging population and the rise of chronic conditions such as heart disease and diabetes as the reasons. Healthcare support occupations are projected to grow 13.3%, the fastest of any major occupational group. Total U.S. employment is projected to grow 3.5%.

This isn't only a healthcare problem

Healthcare's workforce is not older than the rest of the economy. Across all industries, 23% of U.S. workers were 55 or older in 2025. The share is 25% in manufacturing, 24% in educational services, and 22% in construction, according to the BLS. Every one of these industries is losing experienced people to retirement.

What makes healthcare different is demand. A factory with fewer workers can slow production. A clinic with fewer workers has longer wait times for appointments, and patients go without care. Healthcare is also the only large sector where retirements and fast job growth are happening together, which is why its shortage gets more attention than the others.

Career changers can fill part of the gap

Healthcare is hiring while much of the economy is not. U.S. employers added 29,000 jobs in September 2026, and 17,000 of them were in health care, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Health care added an average of 33,000 jobs a month over the prior 12 months.

Other industries are cutting down. Employers announced 529,914 job cuts from January through August 2026, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas. Technology companies accounted for 155,126 of them, and artificial intelligence was the stated reason for 116,175. Separately, the BLS recorded 1.6 million layoffs and discharges in August 2026 alone.

Many of the people in those numbers already have skills that healthcare employers need. O*NET OnLine, the federal database of job requirements, lists active listening, speaking, critical thinking, and service orientation among the top skills for medical assistants. The work styles it ranks highest are empathy and cooperation. A retail manager who has spent years calming upset customers and building staff schedules has practiced most of that list. So has an office worker who keeps records accurate, or a call center employee who solves problems on the phone all day.

What these workers lack is clinical or technical training, and that can be taught in months.

Our industry's hiring habits have often kept these people out. Healthcare has suffered for too long from its own rigidity. We tell ourselves that we only want the best of the best. But we have millions of people to serve, and we need workers to do it. If we keep hiring the way we always have, we're going to have a problem.

I've met a lot of people who can see themselves in healthcare but assume there are too many barriers to getting in. Employers who lower those barriers get access to workers their competitors are ignoring.

Early-career workers need a way in

Interest in healthcare careers is rising among students. More than 2 million undergraduates were enrolled in health professions programs in spring 2026, the third straight year of growth, according to the National Student Clearinghouse. Enrollment at two-year institutions rose 7.1% to 851,000 students.

Many of these jobs don't require a four-year degree. The BLS lists a postsecondary nondegree award as the typical entry-level education for medical assistants. The occupation had a median wage of $45,690 in May 2025 and is projected to grow 13% through 2035, with about 109,700 openings a year.

Not everyone wants to be a doctor, and nobody has to be one to build a career here. Healthcare is one of the few fields where you can start without any formal knowledge of the work and build up from there. You get started in a job, you earn your way to the next level, and how far you go is up to you. There will always be a need for you.

The wage data shows how much room there is to grow. The median annual wage was $38,340 for healthcare support occupations and $86,530 for healthcare practitioners and technical occupations in May 2025, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A person who starts in a support role and keeps training can move toward the higher-paying group over time.

Young people who learn about these options before they enter the workforce can make better decisions. A high school student who knows that sterile processing, phlebotomy, and medical coding exist has more choices than one who only knows about doctors and nurses.

Training pathways build the pipeline

Employers who need workers in months can't depend only on programs that take years. Short, career-focused training gives them a faster option, and it works for several groups:

• High school students exploring careers
• Recent graduates entering the workforce
• Career changers who want stable work
• Current employees who want to move up

At U.S. Career Institute, we offer 13 healthcare certificate programs to partner organizations, including Medical Assistant, Patient Care Technician, Pharmacy Technician, Sterile Processing Technician, and Medical Coding & Billing. The programs are online and self-paced, so that employees can study around their shifts.

Employers use the programs in different ways. Through our employer solutions, we support hire-to-train campaigns for new recruits, internal mobility programs that move current staff into higher-skilled roles, and co-branded training with the employer's name on it. Live clinical skills training can be built alongside online coursework.

Some of this work doesn't have to happen in a building. About 6.4 million Medicare beneficiaries used telehealth in 2025, or 23% of those eligible, according to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. Each of those visits needs someone to schedule it, document it, and bill it. The people we train affordably online can do those jobs.

Training gets people in the door. Feeling valued keeps them.

Hiring and training solve half of the succession problem. The other half is keeping people long enough for the investment to pay off.

New workers are the most likely to leave. Press Ganey's 2026 analysis of more than 2.6 million healthcare workers found that about one-third of employees in their first six months leave within a year. Turnover among Gen Z employees was 35%, compared with 14% for Gen X.

I tell employers to think about creating a barrier to exit, meaning a reason for an employee to stay. Education is a great one. When you train someone and invest in them, you give that person a reason to stay that a competitor can't match with a slightly higher wage.

Survey data supports this. In a May 2026 MGMA poll of 303 medical practices, 30% reported lower turnover than the year before. Those practices credited better onboarding and training, predictable scheduling, and clearer paths for advancement. Practices with higher turnover described temporary staffing and more recruiting, which are reactions to losing people.

Many employers still treat career development as a low priority. In SHRM's 2026 Employee Benefits Survey of 5,472 HR professionals, 64% rated professional and career development benefits as very or extremely important. That was the lowest rating of any major benefit category.

Training alone won't hold people, though. The harder part belongs to the operations and clinical care teams who work with new employees every day. They are the ones who have to look after these people so they don't want to leave. The same Press Ganey analysis found that more than one-third of healthcare employees have low confidence in senior leadership, so many organizations have work to do here.

Every employer should ask one question: Why would anyone want to stay with you? We can't answer that for you, but we can advise. In my experience, the answer comes down to making people feel valued in ways that go beyond a paycheck. A lot of people never get that in their careers. The employers who give it to them keep them.

Preparing for healthcare's next generation

The numbers point in one direction. About 4.5 million healthcare workers are at or near retirement age, the 65-and-older population is growing fast, and the sector is projected to add more than 2.2 million jobs by 2035. Employers will need to fill about 1.9 million healthcare openings a year.

The workers exist. Some were laid off from other industries and have the people skills healthcare needs. Others are students who haven't yet heard about the jobs available to them. Many already work in healthcare and want a better role. Short training programs can prepare each group in months.

Employers who start now will have trained people in place before their most experienced staff retire. Those who also give employees a clear path forward and a reason to feel valued will keep them.

Whether you're exploring your first career or considering a career change, healthcare offers opportunities to develop in-demand skills and contribute to a field that continues to grow. If you're an employer building your own pipeline, review our employer solutions.

Sources

• Bureau of Labor Statistics: Current Population Survey, Table 18b. Employed Persons by Detailed Industry and Age (2025)
• Bureau of Labor Statistics: Employment Projections: 2025–2035 Summary (2026)
• Bureau of Labor Statistics: Occupational Outlook Handbook, Healthcare Occupations (2026)
• Bureau of Labor Statistics: Occupational Outlook Handbook, Medical Assistants (2026)
• Bureau of Labor Statistics: The Employment Situation, September 2026 (2026)
• Bureau of Labor Statistics: Job Openings and Labor Turnover, August 2026 (2026)
• U.S. Census Bureau: Populations in All Age Groups Growing in the South, Driven by Outlying Counties in Metro Areas (2026)
• Health Resources and Services Administration: State of the U.S. Health Care Workforce, 2025 (2025)
• Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services: Medicare Telehealth Trends Snapshot (2026)
• O*NET OnLine: Medical Assistants, 31-9092.00 (2026)
• National Student Clearinghouse: Undergraduate Enrollment in Health Professions Continues Multi-Year Growth in Spring 2026 (2026)
• Challenger, Gray & Christmas: Challenger Report, August 2026 (2026)
• Press Ganey: We're Making Progress in Employee Engagement. Now Comes the Hard Part. (2026)
• MGMA: Stabilized but Not Solved: Staff Turnover in 2026 (2026)
• SHRM: 2026 Employee Benefits Survey Executive Summary (2026)