Does informal care from children to their elderly parents substitute for formal care in Europe?

Bonsang, Éric

doi:10.1016/j.jhealeco.2008.09.002

Cited by 478 publications

(486 citation statements)

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“…Instrumental variables used in the literature include the gender, birth order and marital status of children. While these variables are strong predictors of co-residence, they may have direct effects on the mental health of older parents (Bonsang, 2009). In this paper, we use as instrument the country-, year-, age-and gender-specific unemployment rate for adult children.…”

Section: Empirical Approachmentioning

confidence: 99%

Under one roof: The effect of co-residing with adult children on depression in later life

Courtin

Avendaño

2016

Social Science & Medicine

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Rationale. The number of older parents living without adult children has increased dramatically over the last decades. However, recent trends exacerbated by the Great Recession have led to an increase in intergenerational co-residing. Methods. We used three waves of data (2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010) from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) collected around the great recession to assess the effects of intergenerational co-residence on mental health in later life (n=50,043). We used an instrumental variable approach that exploits changes in employment opportunities of adult children during the great recession to examine the impact of coresiding with adult children on depression scores measured using the Euro-D scale of depression. Results. Northern European countries exhibited low levels of both co-residence and depression in older age, while most countries in Eastern and Southern Europe had high levels of both co-residence and depression. In OLS models that controlled for measured characteristics, co-residing with an adult child was not associated with depressive symptoms in older parents (β=-0.0387; 95% CI -0.0892 to 0.0118). By contrast, results from IV models suggest that co-residing with an adult child significantly reduces depressive symptoms by 0.731 points (95% CI -1.261 to -0.200) on the 12-item scale.Results were robust to a series of robustness checks including controls for child characteristics, country-specific time trends, and analyses restricted to homeowners. Conclusions. Our findings suggest that, in the context of high unemployment rates during the Great Recession in Europe, increased intergenerational exchange between adult children and older parents in the form of co-residence had positive mental health effects on older parents.

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Section: Empirical Approachmentioning

confidence: 99%

Under one roof: The effect of co-residing with adult children on depression in later life

Courtin

Avendaño

2016

Social Science & Medicine

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“…Overall, their results, based on a nationally representative sample of noninstitutionalized people over 70 years old in the US, confirm substitutability between formal and informal care, except for postoutpatient surgery care. Bonsang's (2009) Analyses based on exploiting regional variation in availability of public programs show that their existence affects the use of formal care. McKnight (2006) finds that, in the US, the reduction in Medicare reimbursements following the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 led to a significant decrease in home care, which was not offset by other measures of formal care.…”

Section: What Constitutes Ltc?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Long-Term Care in Latin America and the Caribbean? Theory and Policy Considerations

2017

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in Long-Term Care in Latin America and the Caribbean? Theory and Policy Considerations SEPTEMBER 2017Any opinions expressed in this paper are those of the author(s) and not those of IZA. Research published in this series may include views on policy, but IZA takes no institutional policy positions. The IZA research network is committed to the IZA Guiding Principles of Research Integrity. The IZA Institute of Labor Economics is an independent economic research institute that conducts research in labor economics and offers evidence-based policy advice on labor market issues. Supported by the Deutsche Post Foundation, IZA runs the world's largest network of economists, whose research aims to provide answers to the global labor market challenges of our time. Our key objective is to build bridges between academic research, policymakers and society. IZA Discussion Papers often represent preliminary work and are circulated to encourage discussion. Citation of such a paper should account for its provisional character. A revised version may be available directly from the author. services in Latin America. Demand for these services will rise as the region undergoes a swift demographic transition from its currently young population to a rapidly aging one, especially since the region's aging cohorts are more prone to experience a decline in their functional and physical abilities than elderly people elsewhere in the world. We argue that private insurance markets are ill-equipped to provide coverage to meet the need for LTC, while the amount of personal savings required to afford self-insurance is prohibitively high.We study how developed economies have dealt with the issue of LTC and pay special attention to the most salient features of their LTC programs. We then direct the discussion to Latin America, where LTC may not be an immediate priority, but governments are likely to encourage the development of LTC programs as demand for them steadily grows. In particular, policymakers are probably going to focus initially on LTC programs for the poor and the vulnerable, for whom LTC affordability is a greater problem. We therefore study how basic elements of policy design affect cost-effectiveness of LTC programs by means of a formal model. Our study shows that pro-poor programs are more cost effective when people have the option to receive cash subsidies, and the availability of in-kind and in-cash choices reduces program costs overall. We argue th...

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“…Another example of the way in which state arrangements lighten crossgenerational interdependence in families comes from research on support to ageing parents. Studies have repeatedly shown that when paid professionals take on complex, repetitive and intensive care tasks, adult children have more time to provide unstructured and non-technical help (e.g., Bonsang, 2009;Brandt, Haberkern, & Szydlik, 2009). Adults aged 50 and over are more likely to provide practical help (i.e.…”

Section: Legislation Shaping Cross-generational Interdependencementioning

confidence: 99%

How demographic patterns and social policies shape interdependence among lives in the family realm

Dykstra

Hägestad

2016

Population Horizons

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Our starting point is that a social psychological approach dominates the literature on interdependent or "linked" lives (Elder, 1994). We argue that interdependence is not only social-psychological, but is also structured on a macro-level. More specifically, we illustrate ways in which demographic change, such as increased co-longevity, creates different opportunities for interdependence for men and women. In addition, we draw attention to the role of national policies, distinguishing ways in which legislation mandates generational interdependence (e.g., legal obligations to provide financial support), blocks generational interdependence (e.g., grandparents not granted the right to raise grandchildren when parents cannot provide adequate care; migration laws not granting temporary visits to enable the provision of care), generates generational interdependence (e.g., daddy quota), and lightens generational interdependence (e.g., less reliance on grandparental care in Northern and Western Europe due to public support to parents of young children). We pay specific attention to childless men and women, questioning the primacy assigned to kinship ties in health care and long-term support policies. Gender receives consistent consideration throughout the paper.

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Does informal care from children to their elderly parents substitute for formal care in Europe?

Cited by 478 publications

References 32 publications

Under one roof: The effect of co-residing with adult children on depression in later life

Under one roof: The effect of co-residing with adult children on depression in later life

Long-Term Care in Latin America and the Caribbean? Theory and Policy Considerations

How demographic patterns and social policies shape interdependence among lives in the family realm

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