October 9, 2019
Caring responsibilities mean 1 in 5 mid-life people quit jobs
Over 2.6 million employees aged 45 and over expect that they will have to leave their jobs in order to care for a relative or partner, according to new research from Aviva. This equates to one in five (19 percent) employees in this age group. Many mid-life employees are opting to take on their relatives’ caring duties themselves as a means of minimising care bills, but this decision is coming at the expense of their career.
Women are set to see their careers curtailed by having to leave work to take up caring responsibilities for a relative or partner to the greatest extent, with a fifth (20 percent) expecting to leave work for this reason, compared with 17 percent of men.
It’s not just the care needs of older relatives that mid-life employees are having to contend with, as those aged 45 and over are facing care demands from both ends of the age spectrum.
One in 10 (10 percent) mid-life employees expect they will have to leave work in order to care for children or grandchildren, highlighting the pressures being faced by the so-called ‘sandwich generation’ as they look to support both younger and older generations.
Despite the care conundrum expected to cause one in five employees to leave their jobs, just 6 percent of UK employers consider care pressures a significant issue being faced by their mid-life workforce.
