OK, that makes for a pretty short post. But once I tell you what I’m talking about, you will want to know more — and it’ll make for a nice little topic for small talk at your next cocktail party.
Child support, in German, is “Kindesunterhalt.” And if I tell you that “Eltern” in German means “parents,” you’ll be able to draw the conclusion that Elternunterhalt means “parent support,” and you’ll be correct. (All of the following actually comes from Wikipedia.de, here and here.)
Specifically, it refers to the obligation of a child to pay the nursing home costs of a parent, to the extent they exceed health insurance benefits. The formula functions much the same as the “expected family contribution” calculation for American parents applying for financial aid: there’s a fixed amount of “Selbstbehalt” calculated based on family size and other needs (e.g., work-related expenses, debts, etc.), there are exemptions for a moderate amount of retirement savings, and half the excess income beyond this amount can be taken by the government to pay for the nursing home. In addition, assets can be taken, with the ability to keep only a modest amount of savings.
If there are siblings, Elternunterhalt can be collected from any or all of them who have incomes over the “Selbstbehalt” amount; if this total amount exceeds the amount of the nursing home costs, then a pro-rated amount will be taken from each child.
If the children can’t afford to pay, then the government can go after the grandchildren.
And it doesn’t matter if the children haven’t had contact with the parents, except for (if my German reading comprehension is good enough) cases where the parents were neglectful of the children or other circumstances. But if they were bad parents on account of mental illness, then the kid is still responsible.
What happens if all of the children have incomes below this Selbstbehalt level? Or if, as is the case for many young Germans today, they never had any children? Well, then, the state pays. And, from what I can tell, there’s not an issue, as is the case in the U.S., that there’s a difference in the quality of institution between a “private-pay” patient and a Medicaid patient — or, rather, that good-quality nursing homes generally demand that prospective residents have enough assets to manage a good couple years at “full price” to subsidize the costs of those patients who have outlived their assets, and that the sorts of nursing homes which accept Medicaid right off the bat are the sorts of places none of us would want our parents to be.
So there’s no real benefit in sucking up and paying the Elternunterhalt (again, if I understand it correctly); it doesn’t buy you peace of mind that your parents are being cared for better than they would if you cheat your way out of your obligations. And there’s no benefit in having had kids in the first place, either, because otherwise you just get the nursing home paid as a welfare benefit right away.
(Apparently, they try to come after you even if you live overseas, though I don’t know how they do that! But nursing homes are only a fraction of the cost there than here.)
And now is the point at which I say: what do you think? Is this fair to adult children? Is it a perverse incentive towards childlessness, in a country with such a low birth rate? At any rate, it avoids issues of Medicaid fraud; parents can’t just transfer assets to their children and claim poverty.
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