This paper looks at the economic impact of informal care on the lifetime income and retirement savings of Australian carers. It is therefore a model of opportunity cost from the carer perspective, and complements previous work undertaken for Carers Australia looking at alternative or replacement cost.
The model simulates the full distribution of carer impacts in Australia, variously including observed distributions of:
Gender;
Age at first call to care;
Duration of care;
Employment status before and after caring;
Income before caring; and
Superannuation balance at commencement of caring.
At the mean, and at current subsidy settings, Australian carers will lose:
$392,500 in lifetime earnings to age 67; and
$175,000 in superannuation at age 67.
Some who are carers for extended periods of time will lose substantially more, with the most affected 10% losing at least $940,000 in lifetime income, and $444,500 in retirement savings.
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