RETIREMENT DAILY SPECIAL REPORT: SHARED HOUSING, FAMILY CAREGIVING CONTRIBUTE TO POSITIVE RETIREMENTS

By Mary Helen Gillespie 

Families matter, especially as we age.

Caregiving by, and living with, extended family members may combine to influence not only the quality of life of retirees but their life span — depending on their racial and cultural heritage, new research findings show. Shared housing also contributes to the overall well-being of most elders who are relieved of the escalating costs of living alone including the important non-monetary factor of loneliness, a critical concern for the final decades of life.

However, it is often a long and bumpy road from the empirical findings of academic research to implementation in day-to-day reality in the United States. A recent panel on “Multigenerational Housing and Caregiving” outlined four specific research topics that addressed potential improvements in the quality of life for older Americans and their families.

While multigenerational housing and solo living for retired individuals are both rising in the United States, the stigma of living with one’s parents has become normalized in part due to the lingering aftermaths of both the Great Recession and the pandemic. This is especially true for white families, according to Stephanie K. Firestone of AARP. Her remarks preceded academic research unveiled on August 8, 2024, at the Retirement and Disability Research Consortium in Washington, D.C. sponsored by the Social Security Administration and hosted by The Center for Retirement Research at Boston College.

Firestone, the AARP’s international senior strategic policy advisor, said barriers to successful multigenerational housing include overcrowding, where too many people are jammed into a living space like a single-family home designed for two parents and several children. But when it works, multigenerational housing can help empty nesters with the costs of upkeep of their home and other expenses as well as mitigate loneliness, often the most crucial factor to elder quality of life according to gerontologists and other experts.

“We can learn from other countries,’’ Firestone said, noting that Singapore pays families annual fees to encourage multigenerational housing as a mutual system of support for all family members. In the United States, paid caregiving remains a social and economic hot topic that is not getting much traction at the federal level and varies widely by state.

Whether for grandchildren or another adult, the findings presented at the consortium showed that caregiving shortens lifespans among certain racial and ethnic groups while not impacting others.

Grandparents, lifespans and race

Hongwei Xu of Queens College presented the findings of the paper “Co-resident Grandparents’ Mortality Risk by Race/Ethnicity” co-authored by John R. Logan of Brown University and Todd K. Gardner of the U.S. Census Bureau. Past data has indicated that grandparents who are the primary caregivers for grandchildren suffer difficulties with physical health, psychosocial health and economic condition in various ways. This new research showed “substantial racial/ethnic variations in the association between co-resident grandparenting and mortality. Living with and raising grandchildren is consistently associated with higher risks of mortality for non-Hispanic white grandparents, but reduced risks of mortality for Asian American grandparents.”

Their paper also suggested that Black co-resident grandparents might experience higher mortality risks “because of their disadvantages in household structures, socioeconomic status, acculturation, and disability. Similarly, Hispanic co-resident grandparents might experience higher or lower risks of mortality because they had certain advantages or disadvantages in other demographic, socioeconomic, cultural, and health domains, but not due to co-resident grandparenting per se.”

Xu suggested in comments to the audience that the reason Hispanic and Asian elders had reduced risks of higher mortality was because multi-family living has been normal in their families for generations. Family dynamics revolve around the many generations living under one roof, especially in Asian households, he said.

Do married couples live longer?

Married couples represent the demographic most likely to retire earlier and live longer, according to Jennifer Caputo’s of Westat’s paper “How Are Household Living Arrangements Related to Retirement Expectations and Savings Across Race and Ethnicity?”

“Taken together, I interpret the findings as providing further support for research highlighting the benefits of marriage for economic security in mid- to later-life. Adults who lived with a spouse were more likely to expect that they would retire on time and at younger ages over a historical period of almost two decades,” the paper said.

The results also suggest that living with an adult child only or alone may have some disadvantages for retirement outcomes if the adult child is struggling financially, Caputo told the consortium.

“However, these patterns differ across race and ethnicity. Overall, negative implications of living with an adult child for retirement expectations only appear to be present for white parents, while Black parents living with an adult child planned to retire somewhat earlier than same-race peers who lived only with a spouse,” the paper said.

In addition, living alone predicted a higher probability of working after 65, while living with both an adult child and spouse predicted lower prospective Social Security wealth for white respondents only. These patterns are largely consistent with prior research suggesting that “diverse living arrangements, particularly multigenerational households, have more positive health, social and economic well-being implications for minority families,” according to the paper.

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The costs of co-housing

Meanwhile, older Americans who live in multigenerational housing with other adults who are the actual homeowners or legal renters spend less in housing costs and more in other spending, according to Kristin L. Perkins of Georgetown University who presented the paper “Do Shared Households Reduce or Increase Housing Cost Burden among Older Adults?” co-authored with Hope Harvey and Lucas Taulbee, both of the University of Kentucky.

“We find that 23% of older adults live with another adult who is not their romantic partner,” the paper stated. “Our results reveal that the financial benefits to living in shared households accrue primarily to older adults who are guests in others’ homes…We estimate that guests save over $700 a month by living in someone else’s home. If guests are contributing financially to the housing cost, they are contributing far less than we would expect them to pay if they lived alone.”

On the other hand, the paper noted that the homeowner or renter has higher housing costs, on average, than older adults in nonshared households. “Guests are saving money in shared households,” Perkins said.

True costs of elder care

“Who Pays for Elder Care? An Analysis of the Burden on Caregivers and Families” by Jessica Forden and Teresa Ghilarducci, both of The New School, and Siavash Radpour of Stockton University, said that care in the United States is largely provided by unpaid family and friends, with 41.8 million adults providing care to an older adult in 2019, with many adult children spending both time and money to provide that care.

Forden told the consortium that “18% of Black and 13% of Hispanic” elders receive care from adult grandchildren, a direct impact to those grandchildren’s future Social Security payments and an immediate hit to the current labor force. In addition, she said more than twice as many Black elders receive care from a family member than other races with both the older adult and the caregiver predominantly women. In fact, across all races, “women shoulder a disproportionate burden of caregiving,’’ Forden said.

“Care needs and caregiving both have serious impacts on older households’ finances, as well as to immediate and extended family members. Intergenerational impacts are particularly relevant for lower socioeconomic status elders as they are more likely to receive unpaid care from adult children and grandchildren, as well as extended family care,’’ the paper said.

The result? The paper found the “effects of reduced labor force participation for caregivers extends beyond lost income and include compounded losses in potential savings, potentially lower Social Security benefits after retirement.”

The solution? “Policies that increase the availability of affordable formal care or that address the negative economic effects of caregiving may help. Such policies could include providing Social Security work credits to caregivers or expanding Medicaid eligibility for long term services and supports.”

The reality? All of the panel presenters appear to agree that only time will tell.

HELPFUL LINKS: “Multigenerational Housing and Caregiving’’ panel was moderated by Stephanie Firestone of AARP on the second day of this three-day annual meeting of the Retirement and Disability Research Consortium. The consortium is funded by the Social Security Administration (SSA) and hosted by The Center for Retirement Research at Boston College at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

Related: Retirement Daily Special Report: Debra Whitman of AARP Calls for Action

Related: Retirement Daily Special Report: Multiple Economic Improvements Needed to Boost Retirements of Women of Color

2024-09-06T11:09:24Z dg43tfdfdgfd