The Burden of Caring for Children and Parents: Intergenerational Coresidence, Caregiving and Well-Being of the Caregivers

Firman Witoelar, SurveyMETER

This paper looks at the mental health costs of caring for both offspring and parents by looking at a longitudinal sample of Indonesians who were 23-43 years old in 2000 and who were surveyed again in 2007. The data are from two rounds of the Indonesia Family Life Survey (2000, and 2007), a large-scale, multi-topic longitudinal individual and household survey. The paper focuses on the subjective measures of well-being of the caregivers, namely their self-reported health as well as the CES-D measure of depression and takes into account the health status and ADL/IADL disabilities of their parents. Taking advantage of the richness of the data, I investigate the socio-economic factors that correlate with the subjective well-being of the caregivers. In a country where national social insurance and retirement system are lacking, the increasing pressure on those caring for both children and aging parents could prove to be tolling.