How Not To Pull Your Family Apart

I won’t see the effect until....

In a July 13, 2023 article, Caregivers and Retirement: Findings From the 2023 Retirement Confidence Survey, authors Craig Copeland Lisa Greenwald offer key findings from the 33rd EBRI Retirement Confidence Survey (RCS). The survey examined the retirement prospects, knowledge, preparations for retirement, and experiences in retirement for those who are unpaid caregivers vs. those who do not provide this care. Caregivers in this survey are defined as those who provided unpaid care for an adult and/or child within the last 12 months in a noninstitutional setting and helped their care recipient with at least one activity of daily living or instrumental activity of daily living. “Unpaid caregivers assist with ADLs and IADLs, but they also provide financial support. More than half of working caregivers provide financial support to their care recipient, and these results would suggest that it’s often to the detriment of their own financial health,” observes Lisa Greenwald, CEO, Greenwald Research. Significantly, fifty-five percent of caregiving workers and 37 percent of caregiving retirees report that they provide financial support to their caregiving recipient. Over one-third of caregiving workers (35 percent) and caregiving retirees (37 percent) say they provided $5,000–$14,999 in financial support to their caregiving recipient in the past 12 months. In conclusion, the authors point out that “even though caregivers are doing many of the right things in preparing for retirement, caregivers appear to be behind in savings and their confidence about their retirement due to their caregiving responsibilities.”