Amid growing concern regarding the potential added burden of care due to population aging, we have very little understanding of what is the burden of care in aging populations. To answer this question, we introduce a novel metric that encompasses demographic complexity and social context to summarize unpaid family care work provided to children, elderly, and other family members across the life cycle at a population level. The measure (Care Life Expectancy), an application of the Sullivan method, estimates the number of years and proportion of adult life that people spend in an unpaid caregiving role. We demonstrate the value of the metric by using it to describe gender differences in unpaid care work in 23 European aging countries. We find that at age 15, women and men are expected to be in an unpaid caregiving role for over half of their remaining life. For women in most of the countries, over half of those years will involve high-level caregiving for a family member. We also find that men lag in caregiving across most countries, even when using the lowest threshold of caregiving. As we show here, demographic techniques can be used to enhance our understanding of the gendered implications of population aging, particularly as they relate to policy research and public debate. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11113-021-09640-z.

Objectives Amid growing concerns about the economic implications of population aging and the sustainability of older adults’ working life, unpaid family care work receives less attention despite its direct relevance to population aging. This paper systematically compares the paid and unpaid working life expectancy at age 50 to understand the overlap and trade-off between paid and unpaid work among older European adults. Method Using data from the Survey of Health and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) with the Sullivan method, the paper presents gender differences across 17 countries in life expectancy at age 50 at various paid (employment) and unpaid (caregiving) role configurations. Results When work is defined to include unpaid family caregiving, women and men have similar working life expectancies at age 50, in contrast to prior research. However, its paid and unpaid components are gendered. The results also show that at age 50, women are expected to spend similar number of years providing grandchild care and ADL/IADL care and that most of these years take place after retirement. Discussion The results highlight that the gendered tension between paid and unpaid work persists into older adulthood and needs to be accounted for in working life expectancy measures. The results also underscore the gendered implications of population aging and unpaid work in older adulthood for retirement age policies and strategies for promoting gender equality in later life.

Objective We consider the prevalence of family complexity and its association with children's externalizing behavior problems over children's life course and over historical time. Background A growing literature has demonstrated the prevalence and multidimensional nature of family complexity and its association with child behavior. The nature/strength of this association may have changed in recent cohorts as family complexity has become more normative. Method Data are from the 1997 and 2014 cohorts of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics Child Development Supplement. Samples represent U.S. children aged 0–12 years born since 1985 (N = 5,030). Ordinary least squares regression estimated change in the association between family complexity and behavior between cohorts. Difference‐in‐difference models estimated baseline and longitudinal differences in children's behavior as linked to family complexity. Results The prevalence of family complexity has stabilized over the last two decades, and the antecedents to parental repartnering and complex sibship organization remain similar. The expectation that increasing family complexity contributes to elevated behavior problem scores was not supported. Instead, children who eventually acquired a step‐ or half‐sibling or who experienced parents' union dissolution had elevated behavior problems prior to those changes. Conclusion The prevalence of and precursors to complex family organization were stable across recent child cohorts. The observed association between family complexity and child behavior problems may be attributable to selection mechanisms linked to both parents' family formation trajectories and to children's behavior, rather than to family change itself.

Objective Drawing on life course and gender theories, this study tests competing hypotheses about the effect of repartnering on women's and men's levels and shares of housework. Background Amidst increasing cohabitation rates and union instability, women and men are likely to form and dissolve multiple marital and nonmarital unions with different partners over the life course. However, most of our knowledge about the role of past relationships are based on cross‐sectional studies comparing first‐ and higher‐order union. This study investigates whether people change their housework arrangements upon repartnering and whether women and men experience similar patterns of change in heterosexual relationships. Method The analysis draws on 40 years of longitudinal data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics and a sample of 1897 women and men who were observed in two sequential heterosexual unions. The author used fixed effects models to estimate change in housework behavior upon repartnering. Results Overall, the results show stability in housework behavior upon repartnering once controlling for other life course changes that concur with repartnering. Women continued doing the majority of housework upon repartnering. Conclusion The results suggest that forming a new heterosexual union evokes gender scripts which overall maintains the gendered housework behavior. Although housework is dynamic over the life course, the gender dynamics that shape housework is stable amid union instability.