Editorial: It Is Time to End Finland’s Current Home Care Allowance

Finland’s current home care allowance has reached the end of the road, this editorial argues. The debate gained momentum over the summer after the National Coalition Party and the Social Democratic Party said they wanted to abolish the benefit, though that does not mean the next government will include the change in its program.

The allowance lets a parent, usually the mother, care for a child at home until the child turns three. Researchers also recommended removing it in a study commissioned by the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health. Family leave has been reformed several times since the 2000s, but the home care allowance has remained largely untouched.

The allowance’s stated replacement goal is to encourage fathers to take greater responsibility for childcare and improve women’s position in the labor market. Researchers have proposed extending earnings-related parental leave, with each parent receiving a few additional months and a flat-rate payment higher than the current home care allowance. The National Coalition Party proposed a similar model.

Under Finland’s 2022 family leave reform, both parents received 160 working days of parental leave, with 63 days transferable to the other parent. The reform increased fathers’ use of leave, but fathers still take only slightly more than one-fifth of parental benefit days. If parents use all their days consecutively, the leave ends when the child is about 13 months old, so many families continue with home care allowance afterward.

The Social Insurance Institution of Finland says one in four children aged six months to two years received the allowance at the end of last year. Long-term users are especially common among mothers with lower education or income, single-parent families and mothers with immigrant backgrounds. Dozens of municipalities also pay supplements because home care support costs them less than organizing early childhood education.

Helsinki is considering ending its 264-euro supplement in next year’s budget. The city has already removed the supplement for children over one in 2021 and for children over two in 2019, seeking in particular to help immigrant mothers enter work and bring their children into daycare. The city council will make the final decision later in the year.