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

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  • 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
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    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.
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    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 Social Security Reform: the Roles of Physical and Cognitive Health," Working Papers 2018-12-04, Wang Yanan Institute for Studies in Economics (WISE), Xiamen University.
    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.

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    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

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