Social Stratification in the Time-Use of Informal Caregivers for Older Individuals

Marco Albertini, Università di Bologna, Italy
Francesca Zanasi, University of Bologna

In ageing societies, the increasing share of older adults places significant care burdens on family members, who experience negative consequences on psychological and physical health, and social isolation. These adverse effects are connected with time use restrictions due to prioritizing caregiving. Caregivers often cut on labour market involvement, sleeping, and social activities. Despite extensive research, the socioeconomic disparities in caregiver experiences remain under explored. Our study, using data from the SHARE survey, investigates how health shocks to a partner (i.e., exogenous shocks leading to increasing demands for informal caregiving, such as the onset of dementia, hip fracture, or stroke) influence the caregiver partner’s daily activities, and how socioeconomic characteristics moderate this relationship. Results show that care responsibilities influence the caregiver’s time expenditure, with heterogeneity across socio-economic status. The most affected by a partner’s health shock are individuals at the bottom of the income, wealth and education distributions, significantly increasing time devoted to providing care to the partner. The “currency” utilized to pay for this caring time is leisure time among low-educated women, whereas it is mainly a reduction in paid work among highly educated women. Old European low-educated women are at risk of time poverty when their partners’ health deteriorates.

Keywords: Older Adults and Intergenerational Relations, Inequality, Disadvantage and Discrimination, Population Ageing

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