Policy Recommendations for Coordinated and Sustainable Growth of the Behavioral Health Workforce

Policy Points Demand for behavioral health services outpaces the capacity of the existing workforce, and the unmet need for behavioral health services is expected to grow. This paper summarizes research and policy evidence demonstrating that the long-standing challenges that impede behavioral health workforce development and retention (i.e., low wages, high workloads, training gaps) are being replicated by growing efforts to expand the workforce through task-sharing delivery to nonspecialist behavioral health providers (e.g., peer specialists, promotores de salud). In this paper, we describe policy opportunities to sustain behavioral health workforce growth to meet demand while supporting fair wages, labor protections, and rigorous training.