This originally appeared in the Gerontology Institute blog written by Steven Syre.

More than ever, private long-term care coverage is an insurance product likely to be purchased by affluent customers.

New research by Marc Cohen, co-director of the LeadingAge LTSS Center @UMass Boston, and co-author Eileen Tell found that four of every five buyers of long-term care coverage earned $50,000 per year or more in 2015. People in that income category accounted for just 20 percent of long-term care sales in 1995.

The shift corresponds with significant increase in the cost of the coverage over time. “Fewer middle income people are attracted to the product at current prices,” Cohen and Tell wrote in the latest edition (issue 45) of Long-Term Care News, a publication of the Society of Actuaries.  Read more.