The cost of divorce: how children help their elderly divorced parents?

Sociology

Abstract

In conditions of population aging and decreasing in number in Russia, the government support for the elderly is becoming more and more relevant. The government approaches vary in different countries, but they all rely on private savings accumulated during working life and also support of children. In traditional societies, family transfers play an important role in the welfare of the elderly population, but today their meaning is declining due to demographical and social factors. There arises a question if children really support their parents. Especially in the case of divorced parents, when children have to make a choice who to support — biological or social parents?The questions under research in the current paper are: Do children help their divorced elderly parents? Is there any gender gap? Which factors impact on getting of upward transfers by the divorced elderly?In the research, the author used data of representative «Comprehensive monitoring of living conditions of the population», conducted by Federal State Statistics Service in 2014. The sample includes more than 113 thousand of respondents, 42.5 thousand of which are over retirement age. The methods used in the paper are descriptive statistics and correlation tables. According to the results of the study, divorced elderly get less support from their children than married and widowed respondents. There is a also a significant gender gap in getting help by the divorced elderly, becausemen more often lose connection with their children after divorce. There is an obvious lack of intangible help, which is not sufficient for people with the lowest level of income and the worst health condition — the most vulnerable groups of population.