본문 내용으로 건더뛰기

KDI 경제교육·정보센터

ENG
  • 경제배움
  • Economic

    Information

    and Education

    Center

전망·동향
Cash or care? Insights from the German long-term care system
CEPR
2025.05.08
The German universal long-term care (LTC) insurance program offers beneficiaries the choice between in-kind services and a cash benefit, which can be used for anything, including informal care. The optimal level of the cash benefit depends on substitution between formal and informal care options, the cost of public funds, and distributional considerations. To evaluate various policy options, we estimate a random-coefficients demand model for the period 1999-2015 using data on the universe of LTC patients supplemented with micro moments from the German Mikrozensus. Results show strong heterogeneity in patient preferences for the three different LTC options: informal, ambulatory and stationary care. A counterfactual analysis predicts that abolishing the cash subsidy leads to a decline in patient surplus that far outweighs the savings in public expenditure. It suggests that many countries could benefit from the introduction of a cash subsidy option for LTC.