The week's headline arrives Thursday: AARP is expected to put a number on family caregiving, and the number is expected to cross a trillion dollars for the first time. We'll do a fuller treatment in the April long-form; for now, the preview.
$1.01 trillion, expected
On Thursday, AARP is set to release the Valuing the Invaluable 2026 update. Previewed headline: 59 million Americans providing 49.5 billion hours of unpaid care annually, valued at $1.01 trillion at $20.41 per hour. The figure would exceed total Medicaid spending and would be nearly double all out-of-pocket healthcare spending in the country.
The report is also worth reading for the details under the headline. Over half of family caregivers are now performing tasks that nurses get certified for — catheters, feeding tubes, wound care — and only 22% have received any training. The "untrained nurse" problem will be the under-told story of the report.
Framed against the labor market: 49.5 billion hours is the equivalent of roughly 24 million full-time workers, around 17% of the U.S. full-time workforce.
Vermont weighs in
Vermont is among the states weighing its own caregiver tax credit this session, building on the model first enacted in Oklahoma and Nebraska. The pattern is clear: state-level credits are now spreading faster than the federal Credit for Caring Act can move.
CMS interim rule, still on track
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is expected to publish the interim final rule on Medicaid community engagement requirements by early June. As we covered earlier this month, the implementation specifics will matter more than the law itself for the 7.3 million family caregivers currently on Medicaid.
One small industry note
Rosarium Health, a smaller company in the aging-at-home category, announced new Medicaid and Medicare Advantage partnerships this month. Worth tracking because the partnership model — small, mission-driven aging-care startup integrating with health plans — is increasingly the only viable path to scale in this category.
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