| 陈飞,兰怀周.居家社区养老、健康改善和劳动力市场表现[J].数量经济技术经济研究,2026,(6):31-56 | | 居家社区养老、健康改善和劳动力市场表现 | | Home and Community Care Services for the Elderly, Health Improvement, and Labor Market Performance | | | | DOI： | | 中文关键词: 居家社区养老 健康改善 劳动参与 就业 | | 英文关键词: Home and Community Care Services for the Elderly Health Improvement Labor Participation Employment | | 基金项目: | | | 中文摘要: | | 在人口老龄化持续加深背景下，促进低龄老年群体充分就业是延长人口红利、实现国家积极老龄化战略的关键举措。本文基于2011~2020年中国健康与养老追踪调查数据，采用双重差分法评估居家社区养老试点对低龄老人劳动参与的影响及作用机制。研究发现，居家社区养老试点显著提高了低龄老人就业概率与工作时长。机制分析表明，试点依托社区服务设施供给，能够有效提升养老服务可及性，进而通过当前健康改善与长期健康维持，依次作用于劳动参与的可行性与可持续性，最终提升低龄老人劳动参与水平。异质性分析显示，由于高教育水平低龄老人的经济驱动型就业动机偏弱，试点对该群体的就业促进效应有所削弱；且政策效应呈现显著的城乡与区位差异，仅对农村低龄老人及就近就业群体具有积极促进作用。进一步分析发现，试点并未挤出家庭社会网络，反而增强了子女日常照料投入与照护可及性，这有利于形成养老合力。本文研究为健全居家社区养老服务体系提供了科学依据，也为推动低龄老人老有所为提供了经验证据与政策启示。 | | 英文摘要: | | China’s population aging has become increasingly prominent. Hence, the urgent practical issue of how to fully exploit labor resources to extend the demographic dividend has emerged amid China’s economic transition to high-quality development. This paper takes the home-based community care program as a typical representative of elderly care services, and examines whether elderly care security can help the younger elderly to achieve both a sense of reliance and activity in old age.
Using data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study from 2011 to 2020, this paper employs the difference-in-differences method to evaluate the impact of the home-based community elderly care pilot on the labor participation of the younger elderly, exploring the underlying mechanisms. The results show that the pilot program significantly increased both the employment probability and the working hours of the younger elderly. The results of the mechanism analysis indicate that this pilot enhanced the accessibility of elderly care services by expanding the supply of service facilities, which in turn increased the feasibility and sustainability of labor participation through current health improvements and long-term health maintenance, ultimately boosting the labor participation of the younger elderly. The heterogeneity analysis revealed that policy effects varied depending on the characteristics of human capital. In particular, the impact of the pilot was weaker among highly educated individuals, who exhibited weaker economically driven employment motivation and higher requirements for job matching. Additionally, the employment-promoting effects of the policy showed a significant urban-rural disparity, and were statistically significant only among the rural younger elderly. This pattern was associated with institutional constraints on formal employment in urban areas and the flexible employment ecosystem in rural areas. From the perspective of employment location choice, the positive effect of this policy on participation in nearby employment was strengthened by the reliance of the younger elderly on acquaintance networks and the linkage of community resources. Further analysis showed that this reform did not crowd out family social networks; instead, it increased children’s daily care input and care accessibility, contributing to the generation of a collaborative force for elderly care. This study yields important implications to advance the Healthy China initiative and proactively respond to population aging.
The contributions of this study are primarily reflected along three dimensions. The first dimension is the expansion of the research subject. While existing studies mainly focused on the labor supply of caregivers, this study redefines the younger elderly from care recipients to potential labor force, investigating the impact of the home-based community elderly care pilot on their labor supply and distinguishing between extensive and intensive margin. This perspective fills the current research gaps related to the transformation of service-oriented elderly care security into empowerment for elderly self-employment, extending the evaluation dimensions of elderly care service policy effects.
The second dimension is the deepening of the mechanism chain. Although existing literature confirmed the health improving effects of home-based community elderly care, it has not thoroughly assessed the full transmission chain linking health improvements to labor participation. To this respect, first, this study verifies that the pilot enhanced the accessibility of elderly care services by expanding service facility supply. Then, it reveals how the pilot optimized the feasibility and sustainability of labor participation by increasing health capital stock and slowing health capital depreciation, providing micro-level evidence from the service-oriented security domain for the mechanism through which health promotes elderly employment.
The third dimension is the extension of spillover effects. Building on existing research on the impacts of the pilot on individual health or caregivers, this study analyzes its effects on children’s elderly care behaviors and family social networks. It reveals that this policy integrated family and social resources to create a collaborative force for elderly care, promoting a benign model where social services complement family-based elderly care. This finding deepens the understanding of the interactive relationship between social security policies and family elderly care, offering valuable references for the optimization of the allocation of elderly care resources. | | 查看全文 相关附件： 下载数据代码附录 |
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