Social Impact Investing

SOCIAL IMPACT INVESTMENT: BUILDING THE EVIDENCE BASE
5.2.1 The need (for better) social services: trends in social outcomes
5.5 The extent to which any investment can make a social impact will rely on the type and extent of
need – and demand for improvement – across an array of social outcomes. Social outcomes are evolving in
different directions, in different social sectors, for different reasons – and social services can take a
supporting role in both positive and negative settings. For instance, increasing life expectancy and ageing
societies increase demand for long-term care of various kinds (frailty, dementia, in-home or institutional
care), whereas the increase in single-parent families or families in which both parents work will need to be
facilitated by family care services in preschool and after-school.
5.6 The following subsections provide some examples of evolving needs in health, employment and
activity (including education), housing, public order, and family service sectors.
5.2.1.1 Health and care needs of the elderly
5.7 Although there are many health outcomes and services to consider across the population, the
long-term health care needs of the elderly are of particular interest for the SII discussion for two reasons.
First, the health of the elderly is an important social consideration as societies age, and people live and
work longer. Second, because it is here where the highest voluntary private social spending occurs because
of the intersection of health and old-age spending (OECD, 2014a).
5.8 Figure 5.1 reports on the extent of social need for elderly care, and predictions for social need in
the future. Panel A maps the rates of people aged 65 years receiving long-term care at home or in
institutions (bars), and plots over these figures the prevalence of dementia among the population aged 60
years and over. The demand for elderly long term care (LTC) in OECD countries is high, with 1 in 8
people over 65 receiving LTC, two-thirds of whom are receiving this care at home. Long-term care needs
are determined by health needs, and so by using the example of dementia – a concern for old age in
particular, resulting in progressively high-intensity health and care supports – it can be estimated that at
least half of LTC receivers over 60 will need some high-intensity services at some point in their lives. 19
5.9 The juxtaposition of the figures in Panel A, read alongside the evidence in Panel B, gives the
strongest message for the need for innovative social delivery organisations in these countries. First,
although LTC provision varies widely, the demand for these provisions is likely to be very similar across
countries – and so there is unmet demand. Second, as the scale of dependency increases, demand for care
will increase substantially relative to the working-age population in the coming decades.
19 . As noted earlier in the paper, the G8 has put a special spotlight on the issue of dementia and has been
investigating the role that SII can play in helping to address this growing social concern.
© OECD 2015 59