At the Public Sector Economics journal presentation on 19th September 2023, Maja Matanić Vautmans, Marijana Oreb and Saša Drezgić, from the Faculty of Economics, University of Rijeka, presented their article Socioeconomic inequality in the use of long-term care for the elderly in Europe.

Institutional care in Europe is a synonym for beneficiaries of the most severe health and physical conditions, whose needs require professional care in an institution and 24-hour supervision. Home care is intended for those who need less care than institutional and can be provided by formal (trained) or informal caregivers (often family members, friends or volunteers).

Authors emphasized that the use of formal and informal care for the elderly depends on income, urban-rural environment, educational attainment, family composition, age and severity of health complications. Using the latest data from SHARE (Survey of Health, Aging and Retirement in Europe), they examined the impact of socioeconomic inequalities among older people in the use of home care in the EU, indicating that the pro-poor distribution of long-term care prevails in most of the studied countries. At the same time, health variables contribute to pro-poor inequality of long-term care, mainly in informal care. In formal care, most countries have pro-poor contributions. Formal care inequalities disappeared when adjusted for need factors, while informal care inequalities remained in most countries.

The presentation was moderated by Marijana Bađun from the Institute of Public Finance.