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The effect of unemployment on care provision

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  • Fischer, Björn
  • Haan, Peter
  • Sanchez, Santiago Salazar

Abstract

In this paper we estimate the effect of unemployment on informal care provision. For the identification we use plant closures as a source of exogenous variation and combine difference-in-differences with matching based on entropy balancing. The analysis is based on data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP). We find that there is a time conflict between employment and informal care provision. Unemployment increases the probability of providing care by 2.9 percentage points while the daily hours of care provision rise by around 0.05 h per week-day. Both men and women react with significant increases in care provision. We find the largest effects for women with low education.

Suggested Citation

  • Fischer, Björn & Haan, Peter & Sanchez, Santiago Salazar, 2022. "The effect of unemployment on care provision," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 23(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:joecag:v:23:y:2022:i:c:s2212828x22000287
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jeoa.2022.100395
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Long-term care; Informal care; Long-term care insurance; Labor supply; Unemployment; Plant closure; Entropy balancing;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I11 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Analysis of Health Care Markets
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • I38 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Government Programs; Provision and Effects of Welfare Programs
    • J14 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of the Elderly; Economics of the Handicapped; Non-Labor Market Discrimination
    • J21 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Labor Force and Employment, Size, and Structure
    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply

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