In every intact family there is a caregiver who takes primary responsibility for an aging family member with disabling medical problems. Two-thirds of those caregivers, according to a recent article by Stanford researchers, are women.

Why do women care more than men? Are they genetically determined to give care to distressed people because of emotional endowments that men are not born with? Are they socially determined to give care to others, because they are reared to be “good” by showing empathy? Are they economically determined to give care because their spouses, brothers or others are too busy contributing to the major part of financial support for the rest of the family?

My guess is that women are genetically, socially and economically positioned to provide the majority of care for severely disabled family members. We still have an unequal society, despite the gains by women since the 1970’s second feminist movement.

However, the idea that a “good” woman must give up her own identity as a paying job holder in order to provide the much more difficult, but unpaid and isolating, task of giving care to a dependent relative or friend is noxious, hurtful and unnecessary. It would take nothing away from the workplace to revise the rules, such that neither men nor women who take a leave to give care would be penalized. Anyone who provides care does a service for all of us who pay taxes. Otherwise, a disabled adult would become either homeless or a ward of the state. Thus, full-time caregiving should be rewarded by tax credits or state subsidies, and the workplace should hold a caregiver’s job for when he or she can return.

Giving care to a disabled relative is emotionally rewarding. However, caregiving is not only personal; it is also a tiring administrative job and can be physically too demanding.

The Stanford report revealed that there is a huge caregiving gap between families that can annually afford $100,000 on average for professional home or institutional care for a disabled elder, and those that rely on one family member to provide round-the-clock care without pay or time off. Both alternatives are unrealistic for most families.

This is why the current Senate health care proposal is dead on arrival — the one alternative most families can afford for a disabled elder is financed by Medicaid.

I have a cousin whose family has selfishly turned their backs on her. She is struggling to remain in a rented apartment with occasional caregivers, but her retirement fund is dwindling. Her case is not unusual. When a person has no daughter or sister to assume care, she becomes the financial responsibility of Medicaid. Cutting the funds for her support would only hasten her death or force her on the street (and hasten her death). The only relative helping — from afar — is a female cousin who gave up her profession to devote round-the-clock care for her own spouse.

We do not have enough caregivers for an aging population. We do not have the political will to deal with the expense and resources to care for this population. We are locked in an unequal, outdated set of attitudes that create a trap for women who otherwise could contribute their talents and energies to the workplace.

The problem is growing, the solutions are relatively easy, but we lack the will to implement them: leave from jobs for men and women who give care; tax credits for family members or friends who give care; subsidies for at-home caregivers.

It’s doable, and it’s time to do it. Our elected representatives must put aside their misogynistic biases to pass bipartisan legislation to confront and deal with the most pressing social and political domestic problem of the age: caregiving.