Abstract
AbstractThis paper examines the implications of providing care to elderly parents for adult children's retirement plans using micro data from a Japanese survey. We find no significant effect of caregiving on family caregivers’ planned retirement age if we do not take into account caregiving intensity but find a negative and significant effect on retirement plans for intensive caregivers, particularly among women. These findings suggest that relying on family members to provide elderly care can pose a serious challenge to the ongoing efforts of the government to promote the labor supply of women and the elderly as a way of addressing the shrinkage of the working‐age population in Japan. The estimation results suggest that ensuring access to formal care services can help family members reconcile their paid work with caregiving requirements, thereby alleviating the adverse effect of caregiving on their retirement plans. The results also suggest that the financial burden of formal care services could require caregivers to postpone retirement in some cases.
Highlights
Japan has experienced an unprecedented speed of population aging over the past few decades
Once we take into account the intensity of caregiving, we find that formal care services act as a substitute for parental care that adult children provide among respondents who serve as the main caregiver
Our regression results show no significant effect of caregiving on family caregivers’ planned retirement age if we do not take into account caregiving intensity
Summary
Japan has experienced an unprecedented speed of population aging over the past few decades. Improvements in longevity as well as a significant decline in the fertility rate over the years contributed to this rapid population aging in Japan. Combined with changes in family structure with a downward trend in the parent-child co-residence rate, these demographic trends are likely to reduce the availability of family members to provide elderly care and impose a greater burden on a smaller number of family caregivers per elderly person.. Combined with changes in family structure with a downward trend in the parent-child co-residence rate, these demographic trends are likely to reduce the availability of family members to provide elderly care and impose a greater burden on a smaller number of family caregivers per elderly person.4 This poses significant challenges to Japan where elderly care has traditionally taken place within the family setting. While Japan introduced a mandatory long-term care insurance (LTCI) program in 2000 to promote the greater independence of the elderly in their daily lives and to reduce the burden of elderly care on family members, some studies show that adult children continue to be the most common source of elderly care in Japan (e.g., Hanaoka and Norton 2008; Long, Campbell, and Nishimura 2009)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
