Gender, Ageing and Extended Working Life


Book Description

Nations that are raising retirement ages appear to work on the assumption that there is appropriate employment available for people who are expected to retire later. 'Gender, ageing and extended working life' challenges both this narrative, and the gender-neutral way the expectation for extending working lives is presented in most policy-making circles. The international contributors to this book - part of the Ageing in a Global Context series - apply life-course approaches to understanding evolving definitions of work and retirement. They consider the range of transitions from paid work to retirement that are potentially different for women and men in different family circumstances and occupational locations, and offer solutions governments should consider to enable them to evaluate existing policies. Based on evidence from Australia, Germany, Ireland, Portugal, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States, this is essential reading for researchers and students, and for policymakers who formulate and implement employment and pensions policy at national and international levels.




Women Working Longer


Book Description

Today, more American women than ever before stay in the workforce into their sixties and seventies. This trend emerged in the 1980s, and has persisted during the past three decades, despite substantial changes in macroeconomic conditions. Why is this so? Today’s older American women work full-time jobs at greater rates than women in other developed countries. In Women Working Longer, editors Claudia Goldin and Lawrence F. Katz assemble new research that presents fresh insights on the phenomenon of working longer. Their findings suggest that education and work experience earlier in life are connected to women’s later-in-life work. Other contributors to the volume investigate additional factors that may play a role in late-life labor supply, such as marital disruption, household finances, and access to retirement benefits. A pioneering study of recent trends in older women’s labor force participation, this collection offers insights valuable to a wide array of social scientists, employers, and policy makers.




Extending Working Life


Book Description




Intersections of Ageing, Gender and Sexualities


Book Description

With an increasingly diverse ageing population, we need to expand our understanding of how social divisions intersect to affect outcomes in later life. This edited collection examines ageing, gender, and sexualities from multidisciplinary and geographically diverse perspectives and looks at how these factors combine with other social divisions to affect experiences of ageing. It draws on theory and empirical data to provide both conceptual knowledge and clear ‘real-world’ illustrations. The book includes section introductions to guide the reader through the debates and ideas and a glossary offering clear definitions of key terms and concepts.




Women in Late Life


Book Description

Contemporary old age is fraught with contradiction and complexity—women portrayed either as incompetent and cuddly grandmothers or as young women trapped in old bodies, images that rarely reflect how women actually see themselves. Women in Late Life explores the thorny issues related to gender and aging, including prevailing but problematic cultural expectations, body image, ageism, the experience of chronic illness, threats to Social Security and the very possibility of a secure retirement while challenging a long-term care system that disadvantages women. Author Martha Holstein writes from a critical feminist perspective, drawing on her many years of experience in gerontology, as well as interviews and personal experience as a woman now in her seventies. The book highlights how women’s experience of late life is shaped by the effects of lifelong gender norms, by contemporary culture—from gender stereotypes to ageism—and by the political context. The book blends critique with proposals aimed at resisting damaging inequities resulting from being simultaneously old and a woman. She focuses on changes needed on multiple levels—societal, cultural, political, and individual. This interdisciplinary look at key questions around gender and aging is nuanced and beautifully written.




Health and Safety Needs of Older Workers


Book Description

Mirroring a worldwide phenomenon in industrialized nations, the U.S. is experiencing a change in its demographic structure known as population aging. Concern about the aging population tends to focus on the adequacy of Medicare and Social Security, retirement of older Americans, and the need to identify policies, programs, and strategies that address the health and safety needs of older workers. Older workers differ from their younger counterparts in a variety of physical, psychological, and social factors. Evaluating the extent, causes, and effects of these factors and improving the research and data systems necessary to address the health and safety needs of older workers may significantly impact both their ability to remain in the workforce and their well being in retirement. Health and Safety Needs of Older Workers provides an image of what is currently known about the health and safety needs of older workers and the research needed to encourage social polices that guarantee older workers a meaningful share of the nation's work opportunities.




Aging in Asia


Book Description

The population of Asia is growing both larger and older. Demographically the most important continent on the world, Asia's population, currently estimated to be 4.2 billion, is expected to increase to about 5.9 billion by 2050. Rapid declines in fertility, together with rising life expectancy, are altering the age structure of the population so that in 2050, for the first time in history, there will be roughly as many people in Asia over the age of 65 as under the age of 15. It is against this backdrop that the Division of Behavioral and Social Research at the U.S. National Institute on Aging (NIA) asked the National Research Council (NRC), through the Committee on Population, to undertake a project on advancing behavioral and social research on aging in Asia. Aging in Asia: Findings from New and Emerging Data Initiatives is a peer-reviewed collection of papers from China, India, Indonesia, Japan, and Thailand that were presented at two conferences organized in conjunction with the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Indian National Science Academy, Indonesian Academy of Sciences, and Science Council of Japan; the first conference was hosted by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, and the second conference was hosted by the Indian National Science Academy in New Delhi. The papers in the volume highlight the contributions from new and emerging data initiatives in the region and cover subject areas such as economic growth, labor markets, and consumption; family roles and responsibilities; and labor markets and consumption.




Gender, Social Inequalities, and Aging


Book Description

The experience of men and women in later life varies enormously, not only along the lines of gender but also due to ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, and race. Calasanti and Slevin explore these differences, their genesis, their meaning to men and women, and their treatment in the policy arena.




Preventing Ageing Unequally


Book Description

This report examines how the two global mega-trends of population ageing and rising inequalities have been developing and interacting, both within and across generations.




Beyond Gender Differences


Book Description

Putting gender in a lifespan context, Hatch (sociology, U. of Kentucky) atypically accents the gains as well as losses of aging and sex differences in adaptation overall, to the death of a spouse, and to retirement. From the multifactored theoretical perspectives of symbolic interactionism and polit