Long-Term Care Insurance: Does Experience Matter?
Penn collection
Degree type
Discipline
Subject
Female
Home Care Services
Humans
Insurance, Long-Term Care
Male
Middle Aged
Models, Statistical
Nursing Homes
Parents
Risk Assessment
United States
Caregivers
Female
Home Care Services
Humans
Insurance
Long-Term Care
Male
Middle Aged
Models
Statistical
Nursing Homes
Parents
Risk Assessment
United States
Medicine and Health Sciences
Funder
Grant number
License
Copyright date
Distributor
Related resources
Author
Contributor
Abstract
We examine whether long-term care (LTC) experience helps explain the low demand for long-term care insurance (LTCI). We test if expectations about future informal care receipt, expectations about inheritance receipt, and LTCI purchase decisions vary between individuals whose parents or in-laws have used LTC versus those who have not. We find parental use of a nursing home decreases expectations that one's children will provide informal care, consistent with the demonstration effect. Nursing home use by in-laws does not have the same impact, suggesting that individuals are responding to information gained about their own aging trajectory. Nursing home use by either a parent or in-law increases LTCI purchase probability by 0.8 percentage points, with no significant difference in response between parents' and in-laws' use. The estimated increase in purchase probability from experience with LTC is about half the previously estimated increase from tax policy-induced price decreases.