Providing unpaid care for an older parent has costs that go well beyond a caregiver’s lost wages. A new estimate suggests that the median direct and indirect costs of caregiving are 180,000overtwoyears,aboutthesameasfull−timeinstitutionalcare.Thisestimateaccountsforlostearningsaswellasnon−tangiblefactors,suchaslostleisuretimeandchangestothecaregiver’swell−being.Itsuggeststhatinformalcarecostcaregiversatleast277 billion in 2011, which is 20 percent higher than estimates that only consider lost wages