Meeting the Long-Term Care Needs of the Baby Boomers: How Changing Families Will Affect Paid Helpers and Institutions

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Author(s): Richard.W. Johnson; Desmond. Toohey; Joshua.M. Wiener

Research Area: Health

Type: Report

Abstract:

The long-term care delivery system in the United States includes informal care, paid home care, residential care facilities and nursing homes. With the aging of the “baby boom” generation the elderly population is expected to grow from 35 million persons to 85 million persons between 2000 and 2040. This study contributes to the debate on the future of long-term care by providing projections to 2040 of the number and percent of older people with disabilities and their use of long-term care services. Using projections from the Urban Institute, this study was able to go beyond previous ones by modeling the effect of new factors on disability rates, such as the impact of education.
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Key Findings:
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* Even assuming disability rates may fall by 1 percent each year, the size of the disabled population will grow by 50 percent between 2000 and 2040.
* The number of older adults using paid home health care will increase by three-fourths between 2000 and 2040 and the number of people in nursing homes will increase by two-thirds.
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The financing of long-term care arrangements deserves attention from policy-makers, as more people require care for basic services at home or from an institution.