Employee benefits have come along way over the last several years, and when it comes to allowing families to help out older loved ones, there’s no exception. More and more employers realize that help is needed here, and they are figuring out ways to provide it.
Back before the pandemic, about one in five families were providing some sort of unpaid care to an older loved one. About 23 percent of family caregivers said their health suffered as a result of providing care to a loved one. 45 percent said they were financially burdened as a result of it. More than 60 percent of them were working full time while caring for a loved one.
There were a lot of people in need already, but they were flying under the radar because senior care wasn’t such a hot topic. However, after the tragedy of COVID-19 has made this a household subject. The 20 percent of families that were struggling to provide senior care to someone they love on their own are no longer unseen. In fact, as senior care changes, that number has already begun to grow as fewer people look to professional care as their first line of defense. There’s no exact number at this point, but the point is, more family caregivers need assistance than ever before.
At this point, a good number of larger employers have some sort of benefit policy in place designed to make caring for a loved one–older or not–easier on the employee. These policies will differ from employer to employer, so it is important that you speak with a Human Resources representative if you’re unsure of what benefits are in place at your place of work. HR will be able to detail for you how these benefits can be used and what you will need to do on your end to take advantage of them.
If your employer doesn’t have a policy in place, it’s still good to ask. By taking the time to let HR or whoever else is in charge of these things know that this is important to you, you are giving feedback to your employer and giving them a chance to take steps to help the people that work there. They might not know that there’s a large demand for family care benefits until people start asking about it. If enough people ask, this might be something that gets added on to help in the future.
The Infrastructure legislation put in motion by President Joe Biden has the potential to make family care benefits far more widespread than ever before, but really, this is just a start. There’s a lot more work if our society is really going to take the steps necessary
You have help, regardless of whether or not your employer has benefits available to help you. Respite and in-home care are both designed to help keep your loved one safe and supervised in their home, without putting the bulk of the burden on family members.
If this sounds like something that might help, please feel free to reach out. We’d love to talk more about what we do and how it might help your family.
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