Cash-for care in long-term care for older people: a historical and comparative account

Cash-for-care (CfC) schemes are monetary transfers to people in need of care who can use them to organize their own care arrangements by paying informal carers, purchasing market-based services or increasing their income. In recent debates, there has been a tendency to oppose cash benefits and care provision as instruments of care policies, likely to produce distinct effects in terms of protection, redistribution, positioning of informal caregivers and of women's employment. This chapter argues that an assessment of CfC benefits is only possible when looking at them as intertwined, mixed and in relation to care services, and considering the regulatory settings concerning eligibility, generosity and conditionality in their use. Based on this multiple perspective, the chapter provides a historical and comparative account of the measures introduced in selected Western European countries, focusing on CfC benefits available to dependent older people. A specific typology of CfC benefits is then proposed and used to disentangle the logic of CfC and their implications for family caregiving, users’ empowerment, and women's employment.