IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/21940.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Health Capacity to Work at Older Ages: Evidence from the U.S

Author

Listed:
  • Courtney Coile
  • Kevin S. Milligan
  • David A. Wise

Abstract

Public programs that benefit older individuals, such as Social Security and Medicare, may be changed in the future in ways that reflect an expectation of longer work lives. But do older Americans have the health capacity to work longer? This paper explores this question by asking how much older individuals could work if they worked as much as those with the same mortality rate in the past or as much as their younger counterparts in similar health. Using both methods, we estimate that there is significant additional capacity to work at older ages. We also explore whether there are differences in health capacity across education groups and whether health has improved more over time for the highly educated, using education quartiles to surmount the challenge of changing levels of education over time.

Suggested Citation

  • Courtney Coile & Kevin S. Milligan & David A. Wise, 2016. "Health Capacity to Work at Older Ages: Evidence from the U.S," NBER Working Papers 21940, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21940
    Note: AG
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w21940.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Barry P. Bosworth & Kathleen Burke, 2014. "Differential Mortality and Retirement Benefits in the Health and Retirement Study," Working Papers, Center for Retirement Research at Boston College wp2014-4, Center for Retirement Research.
    2. John Bound & Arline Geronimus & Javier Rodriguez & Timothy Waidmann, 2014. "The Implications of Differential Trends in Mortality for Social Security Policy," Working Papers wp314, University of Michigan, Michigan Retirement Research Center.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. John Bailey Jones & Yue Li, 2023. "Social Security Reform with Heterogeneous Mortality," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 48, pages 320-344, April.
    2. Jiayi Wen, 2018. "Occupational Retirement and Pension Reform: The Roles of Physical and Cognitive Health," Working Papers 2018-12-04, Wang Yanan Institute for Studies in Economics (WISE), Xiamen University, revised 28 May 2023.
    3. Birgit Leimer, 2017. "No “Honeymoon Phase” Whose health benefits from retirement and when," Working Papers 1718, Gutenberg School of Management and Economics, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz.
    4. Pamela Giustinelli & Matthew D. Shapiro, 2024. "SeaTE: Subjective Ex Ante Treatment Effect of Health on Retirement," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 16(2), pages 278-317, April.
    5. Nolan, Anne & Barrett, Alan, 2018. "Working Beyond 65 in Ireland," IZA Discussion Papers 11664, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Kevin Milligan & Tammy Schirle, 2018. "The Labor Force Participation of Older Men in Canada," NBER Chapters, in: Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: Working Longer, pages 51-65, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Vandenberghe, Vincent, 2019. "Health, Cognition and Work Capacity Beyond the Age of 50," GLO Discussion Paper Series 295, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    8. Derek Messacar, 2022. "Labor Supply Responses to Income Taxation among Older Couples: Evidence from a Canadian Reform," Cahiers de recherche / Working Papers 10, Institut sur la retraite et l'épargne / Retirement and Savings Institute.
    9. John Bailey Jones & Yue Li, 2023. "Social Security Reform with Heterogeneous Mortality," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 48, pages 320-344, April.
    10. Spijker, Jeroen, 2019. "Combining remaining life expectancy and time-to-death as a measure of old-age dependency related to health care needs," SocArXiv vuaed, Center for Open Science.
    11. Han, Sae Hwang, 2021. "Health consequences of retirement due to non-health reasons or poor health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 273(C).
    12. Congressional Budget Office, 2018. "CBO’s Projection of Labor Force Participation Rates: Working Paper 2018-04," Working Papers 53616, Congressional Budget Office.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Janet Currie & Hannes Schwandt & Josselin Thuilliez, 2020. "Pauvreté, Egalité, Mortalité: mortality (in)equality in France and the United States," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 33(1), pages 197-231, January.
    2. Courtney Coile & Kevin Milligan & David A. Wise, 2017. "Health Capacity to Work at Older Ages: Evidence from the United States," NBER Chapters, in: Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: The Capacity to Work at Older Ages, pages 359-394, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Alan J. Auerbach & Kerwin K. Charles & Courtney C. Coile & William Gale & Dana Goldman & Ronald Lee & Charles M. Lucas & Peter R. Orszag & Louise M. Sheiner & Bryan Tysinger & David N. Weil & Justin W, 2017. "How the Growing Gap in Life Expectancy May Affect Retirement Benefits and Reforms," The Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance - Issues and Practice, Palgrave Macmillan;The Geneva Association, vol. 42(3), pages 475-499, July.
    4. Kevin Milligan & Tammy Schirle, 2017. "Health Capacity to Work at Older Ages: Evidence from Canada," NBER Chapters, in: Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: The Capacity to Work at Older Ages, pages 59-83, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Janet Currie & Hannes Schwandt, 2016. "Mortality Inequality: The Good News from a County-Level Approach," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 30(2), pages 29-52, Spring.
    6. Janet Currie & Hannes Schwandt & Josselin Thuilliez, 2020. "Pauvreté, Egalité, Mortalité: mortality (in)equality in France and the United States," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 33(1), pages 197-231, January.
    7. Michael Baker & Janet Currie & Hannes Schwandt, 2017. "Mortality Inequality in Canada and the U.S.: Divergent or Convergent Trends?," NBER Working Papers 23514, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Teresa Ghilarducci & Siavash Radpour & Jessica Forden, 2023. "No Rest for The Weary: Measuring the Changing Distribution of Wealth in The US," SCEPA working paper series. 2023-02, Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis (SCEPA), The New School.
    9. Irena Dushi & Leora Friedberg & Anthony Webb, 2021. "Is the Adjustment of Social Security Benefits Actuarially Fair, and If So, for Whom?," SCEPA working paper series. 2021-04, Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis (SCEPA), The New School.
    10. Teresa Ghilarducci & Kyle Moore, 2015. "Racially Disparate Effects of Raising the Retirement Age," SCEPA working paper series. 2015-03, Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis (SCEPA), The New School.
    11. Courtney Coile, 2018. "Working Longer in the U.S.: Trends and Explanations," NBER Working Papers 24576, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Anne Case & Angus Deaton, 2017. "Mortality and Morbidity in the 21st Century," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 48(1 (Spring), pages 397-476.
    13. Hendrik Jürges & Lars Thiel & Axel Börsch-Supan, 2017. "Healthy, Happy, and Idle: Estimating the Health Capacity to Work at Older Ages in Germany," NBER Chapters, in: Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: The Capacity to Work at Older Ages, pages 149-180, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Jon D. Wisman & Aaron Pacitti, 2015. "What the American Elite Won over the Past 35 Years and What All Other Americans Lost," Challenge, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 58(3), pages 197-221, May.
    15. Li Tan & Cory Koedel, 2019. "The Effects of Differential Income Replacement and Mortality on U.S. Social Security Redistribution," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 86(2), pages 613-637, October.
    16. Alexander, Monica, 2018. "Deaths without denominators: using a matched dataset to study mortality patterns in the United States," SocArXiv q79ye, Center for Open Science.
    17. John M. Polimeni & Ahmad Almalki & Raluca I. Iorgulescu & Lucian-Liviu Albu & Wendy M. Parker & Ray Chandrasekara, 2016. "Assessment of Macro-Level Socioeconomic Factors That Impact Waterborne Diseases: The Case of Jordan," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 13(12), pages 1-15, November.
    18. Yikang Li & Casey Rothschild, 2020. "Selection and Redistribution in the Irish Tontines of 1773, 1775, and 1777," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 87(3), pages 719-750, September.
    19. Teresa Ghilarducci & Bridget Fisher & Kyle Moore, 2015. "The Hispanic Health Paradox," SCEPA policy note series. 2015-03, Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis (SCEPA), The New School.
    20. Bartik, Timothy J. & Hershbein, Brad & Lachowska, Marta, 2016. "The Merits of Universal Scholarships: Benefit-Cost Evidence from the Kalamazoo Promise," Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 7(3), pages 400-433, October.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • I19 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Other
    • J14 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of the Elderly; Economics of the Handicapped; Non-Labor Market Discrimination
    • J26 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Retirement; Retirement Policies

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21940. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.