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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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Do intergenerational transfers from elderly parents increase social inequality among their middle-aged children?
— evidence from the German Aging Study | | Author(s) | Harald Kunemund, Andreas Motel-Klingebiel, Martin Kohli |
| Journal title | Journals of Gerontology: Series B, Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, vol 60B, no 1, January 2005 |
| Pages | pp S30-S36 |
| Source | http://www.geron.org |
| Keywords | Assets [elderly] ; Parents ; Children [offspring] ; Family relationships ; Economic status [elderly] ; Poverty ; Cross sectional surveys ; Germany. |
| Annotation | Analyses are based on the first wave of the German Ageing Survey in 1996, for respondents aged 40-54. Transfers from parents or parents-in-law during the previous 12 months - many of them smaller ones - are not significantly related to children's incomes. Separated and divorced children have significantly higher probabilities of receiving such transfers, indicating a need-directed family transfer process. Larger transfers before the previous 12 months are need-directed as well, and moreover positively related to income position. Bequests, finally, are positively related to income position, while having no need component at the time of observation. Whereas large monetary transfers and bequests may increase social inequality in the children's generation, a substantial part of the regular monetary flow from ageing parents to their adult children before situations of need. Public policy should take into account these different effects. Reducing the general level of public pensions would weaken regular transfer giving, and thus lead to more inequality in the children's generation. Higher taxation of very large transfers and bequests would have the opposite effect. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-050505215 A |
| Classmark | JD: SR: SS: DS:SJ: F:W: W6: 3KB: 767 |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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