Abstract When faced with the necessity of reforming welfare states in ageing societies, politicians tend to demand more solidarity between generations because they assume that reforms require sacrifices from older people. Political economy models, however, do not investigate such a mechanism of intergenerational solidarity, suggesting that only age‐based self‐interest motivates welfare preferences. Against this backdrop, this article asks: Does the experience of intergenerational solidarity within the family matter for older people's attitudes towards public childcare – a policy area of no personal interest to them? The statistical analysis of a sample with individuals aged 55+ from twelve OECD countries indicates that: intergenerational solidarity matters; its effect on policy preferences is context‐dependent; and influential contexts must – according to the evidence from twelve countries – be sought in all societal spheres, including the political (family spending by the state), the economic (female labour market integration) and the cultural (public opinion towards working mothers). Overall, the findings imply that policy makers need to deal with a far more complex picture of preference formation toward the welfare state than popular stereotypes of ‘greedy geezers’ suggest.
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