Abstract

Objectives

Due to increasing care needs and decreasing care potentials, research around informal caregiving gains attention. Relatively new – but of utmost importance – is the role of socioeconomic inequalities in care and wellbeing. Although caregiving can be rewarding, a growing body of research shows that informal caregiving often has negative consequences for individuals’ wellbeing. Theoretically, we expect these negative outcomes to be more pronounced among caregivers with lower socioeconomic resources. The current study examines socioeconomic inequalities in the consequences of caregiving inside the household for life satisfaction.

Methods

We draw on longitudinal data from the Survey of Health, Ageing, and Retirement in Europe (SHARE waves 2, 4, 5, and 6). We estimated pooled ordinary least squares and fixed-effects regression models to examine the consequences of informal care provision within the household for individuals’ life satisfaction, and whether household wealth moderates this relationship, controlling for individuals’ sociodemographic and health characteristics.

Results

Care provision inside the household was negatively associated with older adults’ life satisfaction. The longitudinal analyses accordingly show that the uptake of care led to declines in life satisfaction. Differentiating by socioeconomic background, we find that caregivers with higher socioeconomic resources in terms of wealth generally experienced higher life satisfaction. Our longitudinal analyses on wellbeing declines reveal, however, that these mechanisms did not significantly differ by socioeconomic status of the caregiver.

Discussion

Our findings suggest the need for increased investments in support services for informal caregivers to mitigate caregiving burdens, irrespective of socioeconomic status, and enhance later life wellbeing.

中文翻译：

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欧洲非正式护理人员福祉中的社会经济不平等

摘要

目标

由于护理需求的增加和护理潜力的降低，围绕非正式护理的研究受到关注。相对较新但最重要的是社会经济不平等在护理和福祉中的作用。尽管看护可以带来回报，但越来越多的研究表明，非正式的看护通常会对个人的福祉产生负面影响。从理论上讲，我们预计这些负面结果在社会经济资源较低的护理人员中更为明显。目前的研究调查了家庭内部看护对生活满意度的影响方面的社会经济不平等。

方法

我们借鉴了欧洲健康、老龄化和退休调查（SHARE 第 2、4、5 和 6 波）的纵向数据。我们估计了合并的普通最小二乘和固定效应回归模型，以检查家庭内提供非正式护理对个人生活满意度的影响，以及家庭财富是否会调节这种关系，控制个人的社会人口和健康特征。

结果

家庭内部的护理提供与老年人的生活满意度呈负相关。因此，纵向分析表明，接受护理导致生活满意度下降。通过社会经济背景进行区分，我们发现在财富方面具有较高社会经济资源的看护者通常具有较高的生活满意度。然而，我们对幸福感下降的纵向分析表明，这些机制并没有因照顾者的社会经济地位而显着不同。

讨论

我们的研究结果表明，无论社会经济地位如何，都需要增加对非正式护理人员支持服务的投资，以减轻护理负担，并提高以后的生活福祉。