Payoff of having children - Do elderly parents of more children live in a nursing home less often?

This thesis examines how having children impacts the probability of elderly parents to be placed in a nursing home using logit models. Three alternative dependent variables are tested - admission regardless of length, long-term and short-term residency. Additional regressors include demographics, living arrangements, health status, social network, functional and cognitive limitations andjobsituation. Theresultsshowthat residential proximity of children affects each type of institutionalisation. Thenumberofchildrenwasimportantforthe overall admissions regardless of length and short-term stays in a nursing home when size of the household was considered. It was never significant in case of long-term stayers. When partners shared a household together, the number of children did not play a significant role in any type of nursing home placement. In a robustness check, the number of grandchildren replaced the number of children. It was significant in case of admissions and short- term residency even though elderly partners shared one household. Therefore, our results implicate that social policy should be focused on attracting younger cohorts to stay in areas densely populated by the elderly. Keywords elderly parents, housing arrangements, number of children Title Payoff of having children - Do elderly..