Family Caregiving

To assist states designing and/or revising HCBS waivers, in this report ADvancing States analyzed how waiver language defines family caregivers and how those definitions relate to older adults without immediate family available as caregivers.

CHCS published a Medicaid Policy cheat sheet detailing the importance of family caregivers. The resource reviews legislation and efforts led by the Biden Administration to support unpaid family caregivers, and answers the following questions: Who are family caregivers and what do they do? What hardships do family caregivers face as a result of providing care? How can legislation help family caregivers?

GAO recently published a report to examine how other countries provide support to family caregivers, challenges present in these approaches, and the development of HHS’ national family caregiving strategy. GAO researched caregiver policies from Australia, Germany, and the United Kingdom, which focused on employment flexibility, income support, and pension credits for family caregivers.

The latest report in the AARP Public Policy Institute’s Valuing the Invaluable series estimates the economic value of unpaid family caregiving at $470 billion in 2017. The report also explores family caregiving trends, highlights federal and state policy changes since the release of the previous Valuing the Invaluable report in 2015, and offers further policy recommendations to enhance the well-being of caregiving families.

This report looks at the role of millennials as family caregivers. As their older family members age, millennials have taken on more responsibilities, and about one in four family caregivers is now a millennial. Millennial caregivers have unique experiences and face specific challenges which affect the type of support they need. This paper provides insight on these unique experiences.