AARP Bulletin - January 2011

Your Money ;
; In hard times, families stick together.
; But when it comes to money, things get tricky.
; How much can you afford to help?

All in the Family

Values are tested in times of financial
stress, and today boomers are on the firing
line. It’s hard to find an American family
that hasn’t been touched by the Great Re-
cession—be it pay cuts, unemployment,
loss of health insurance, foreclosure or
diminished retirement savings.
Add to this the normal strains potential-
ly lying in wait for people in their 50s and 60s: a child’s
divorce or aging parents who need care.
“Home is the place where, when you have to go there,
they have to take you in,” wrote the poet Robert Frost. But
is it true? And how do you decide?
Well-functioning families respond
to this challenge with love, advice and
emotional support. But it gets tricky
when what’s needed is money. How
much you help financially depends
not only on your income and sav-
ings but on your family relationships
and personal feelings about what your obligations are.
The multigenerational family is staging a comeback. In
2008, 16 percent of the population (49 million people)
lived in households of two adult generations or with
grandchildren, the Pew Research Center reports. In
1980, just 12 percent did ( 28 million people).
The recession is accelerating this trend. Older adults
who lose jobs or run short of savings might have no
choice but to move in with their kids. This includes
widows whose husbands didn’t leave behind enough