PNS57 Impacts of Income Resources on Informal Care Usage in England

Abstract

Although various government funding resources are eligible to dependent residents to improve their availability to a professional care service in England, the effectiveness of these financial supports is not verified yet. This research explores whether different income resources influence the informal care choice of care receivers. With 2350 observations in Health Survey for England from 2013 to 2017, Probit model is used to test the significance of various income types on care choice and duration. Dependent individuals having the earnings from work and the personal pension tend to ask for informal care with 49.3% (p=0.015) and 26.5% (p=0.045) possibilities, respectively. But receivers with Income Support prefer not to select informal help (-0.501, p=0.059). On the other hand, residents need informal care for a longer time if they own state pension (0.861, p=0.000), interests from savings or investment (0.416, p=0.000) and other allowance (1.069, p=0.000). Care receivers who gain earnings from work and the personal pension are more likely to choose informal help. By contrast, Income Support, a government financial subsidy to low-income severely disabled residents, successfully improves their accessibility on professional care services. Moreover, dependent individuals with state pension, interest income or other allowance report a longer informal care duration. However, some income types such as house benefit cannot be verified significant with both the choice and the long duration of informal care. These findings provide evidences to support the reform of public care system in the respect of considering impacts from financial structures of care receivers.