Aging & Work Facts Database

Now, for a limited time, the Center on Aging & Work is making this resource available publicly before granting exclusive access to Center Partners & Affiliates, and members of the Center’s research team.

Features of the Aging & Work Facts Database include:

• individual facts searchable by topic
• brief descriptions of studies connected to facts
• powerpoint-ready graphics
• full citations, for those interested in locating the statistic’s source

During this initial period of Beta-testing we welcome your feedback.

After July 1, 2008, Aging & Work Facts will be accessible only through a password protected web page, with exclusive access given to Center Partners, Employer Affiliates, and members of the Center Research Team. For more information on how to become a Partner or Employer Affiliate, please contact agework@bc.edu.

KEYWORD Search Tips:

• Enter one or more keywords in the search box below. Using “and” between keywords is not necessary. To find only facts with graphs, include the word “graph” in your search.
• If you use more than one word in the search box and no results appear, try removing one or more of the words. 
• If no results appear, you may try alternate forms of the word (for example, if "marriage" does not work you may try "marital")
• To view the facts relevant to your search, click on “more” in the first item.  Then use the “next” button to view each of the facts retrieved by your search.
• At this time, exact phrase searching is not available.

TOPIC Search Tips:

• Topics are arranged alphabetically.  Scroll down to view topics, clicking on a topic to access facts of interest.  To view a specific fact, click “more.”  Click the “next” button for additional facts on that topic.
• To view a print-ready file of all of the facts for a particular topic, scroll to the bottom of the results display.

SEARCH BY TOPIC: Age Bias and Employment Discrimination Age Distribution of Population; also, Life Expectancy Business Strategies & Workforce Development Caregiving: Elder According to a 2006 MetLife report on caregiving costs, "nearly 60% of those caring for an adult over the age of 50 are working; the majority of those work full-time... The ma...  more "Almost 13 percent of caregivers provide financial assistance compared to 6 percent of other adult children. This results in an average transfer of $2,661 annually to parents...  more “A slightly larger portion of informal caregivers [of people 65 or older] are adult children today than a decade ago-44 percent in 1999 and 36 percent in 1989.” (p.2)...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 1% of HR professionals strongly disagreed with the statement "eldercare a...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 13% of HR professionals stated that the overall employees in their organi...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 17% of HR professionals reported their organization provided "literature or e...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 21% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "eldercare referr...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 40% of HR professionals reported their organization allowed "employees to wor...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 45% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "flextime for eld...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 54% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "paid sick leave...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 29% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "paid family leav...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 35% of HR professionals reported their organization allowed "compressed work...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 1% of HR professionals strongly disagreed with the statement "providing e...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 3% of HR professionals strongly disagreed with the statement "eldercare i...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 1% of HR professionals strongly disagreed with the statement "providing e...  more "The median annual income of adult children caregivers is slightly smaller than the median annual income of adult children without caregiving responsibilities - $54,720 and $5...  more "Nearly one-quarter - 23 percent - of adults age 51 or older have living parents but do not provide any assistance." (p.2)...  more According to a 2005 Pew Research Center survey, 50% of all boomers were raising one or more young children and/or providing primary financial support to one or more adult chil...  more The adjusted mean lost productive time (LPT*) for a family health reason was significantly higher in younger (less than 40 years of age) than older workers (40 or more years...  more Among 16,000 workers participating in a survey at a large company, caregivers reported an average of 7.7 hours absent from work during the 2-week study period. Among older w...  more Among 16,000 workers participating in a survey at a large company, approximately 5% of older workers (aged 55-64) reported being absent from work to care for an ill family mem...  more Analyses of the National Study of the Changing Workforce suggest that approximately 16.7% of the workforce has responsibility for elder care over the course of a single year....  more "Among adults age 51or older more than one in ten are providing assistance with basic everyday activities to their parents." 12% are the primary caregiver. (p. 2) [Editor...  more According to analysis of the National Study of the Changing Workforce, older adult workers are much more likely than younger workers to report that they have provided some typ...  more "35% of Boomers have been or are responsible for the care of their elderly parent, up nine points since since 1998." (p.8)...  more A study by Chesley and Moen (2006) found that "more women (13.4%)  than men (9.6%) [of middle-class, dual-earner couples] provide care consistently…, whereas more men (...  more The National Study of Employers, which surveyed workplaces with 50 or more employees, found that “79 percent of employers say that they provide paid or unpaid time off for e...  more "Almost two out of five caregivers - 38 percent - volunteer at a hospital, school, church, or other organization in their community. In comparison, 30 percent of adult childre...  more "Similar proportions of caregivers and non-caregivers of working-age (age 51 to 64) are employed - 63 percent and 65 percent, respectively. Three-quarters of employed caregive...  more "Roughly three-quarters - 76 percent - of informal caregivers are married compared to 79 percent of non-caregivers." (Figure 3, p.3)...  more "Over half - 53 percent - of primary caregivers are adult daughters, compared to 43 percent of non-caregivers." (p.3)...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 21% of HR professionals did not report any problems resulting from elderc...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 9% of HR professionals reported their organization has seen "resentment f...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 72% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "leave without pa...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 76% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "unpaid family le...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 88% of HR professionals reported that their organization offered "FMLA leave...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 90% of HR professionals reported that their organization offer...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), “11% of HR professionals reported their organization trains managers to und...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), “eldercare issues indicate a negative impact on an employee’s productivit...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), “almost one-half of HR professionals (47%) indicated that the number of emp...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), “almost three-quarters of HR professionals (74%) allow employees to use eld...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), “when asked whether their organization’s paid time off policy specificall...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), “only 6% of HR professionals reported their organization has a specific pol...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), “only one-quarter (25%) of HR professionals reported their organization off...  more Only two percent of the respondents to The Conference Board survey listed their caregiving responsibilities as a reason for retiring. (p.21)...  more According to the National Alliance for Caregiving and AARP, “male caregivers are more likely to be working full or part-time than female caregivers (66% v 55%). (p.8)...  more "Among women and men of all ages, women ages 50 to 64 are the group most likely to be caring for sick and disabled family members.  Nearly one in five (18%) of these wome...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 69% of respondents reported their employer offered an "employee assistance pr...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 66% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "paid funeral lea...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 16% of HR professionals reported their organization has seen "strained em...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 28% of HR professionals reported their organization has seen "scheduling...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 29% of HR professionals reported their organization has seen "stress-rela...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 74% of HR professionals reported their organization allows employees to u...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 100% of HR professionals reported their organization did n...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 100% of HR professionals reported their organization did n...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 7% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "caregiver sup...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 10% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "job sharing...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 12% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "periodic informa...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 13% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "legal services f...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 13% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "employee leave s...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 13% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "brown bag lunche...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 16% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "long-term care i...  more According to the 2003 Eldercare Survey conducted by Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 64% of HR professionals reported their organization offered "dependent care f...  more According to the National Alliance for Caregiving and AARP, “older caregivers are more likely to say they have been providing care for 10 years or more compared to younger...  more      back to top For a print-ready file of all statistics for this topic, click here. Caregiving: Employer-sponsored benefits for Caregiving: Other (grandchildren, spouse, dependents) Education and Training Educational Attainment Employee Engagement & Job Satisfaction Employer-sponsored benefits (see also Caregiving) Employment Preferences Flexible Work Options (general) Flexible Work Options: Bridge Jobs Flexible Work Options: Consulting, Contract Work, Self-employment Flexible Work Options: Flexible Schedule Flexible Work Options: Leaves of Absence Flexible Work Options: Part-time Employment Flexible Work Options: Phased Retirement Flexible Work Options: Remote Work, Telecommuting, Telework Flexible Work Options: Work Redesign Gender Health: Health Behaviors Health: Health Care Costs Health: Health Insurance Health: Health Status Health: Workplace Injuries Income Knowledge Transfer Labor Force Participation Language and Immigration Marital Status Medicare & Medicaid Mental Health Multi-generational Workplace Older Workers, Advantages of Older Workers, Costs of Older Workers, Job Skills and Demands Older Workers, Perceptions about Peformance & Productivity (includes Absenteeism) Pensions and Retirement Accounts Race, Ethnicity, and Immigration Reasons for working Recruitment , Retention, Tenure, Turnover Retirement Income & Expenditures Retirement Planning Retirement Statistics Retirement, Timing of Social Security Unemployment Voluntarism

DOWNLOAD A FACT SHEET: The following Fact Sheets contain selected facts and statistics from the database ( PDF format): "Mental Health" (Sep 2007) "Bridge Jobs" (Aug 2007) "Part-time Work" (Jul 2007) "The Multi-Generational Workplace" (Jul 2007) "Phased Retirement" (Jun 2007) "Age Bias And Employment Discrimination" (Feb 2007) "Employer Sponsored Pensions" (Feb 2007) "Age and the Labor Force" (Jan 2007) "Social Security and Older Workers" (Jan 2007) "Voluntarism Among Older Adults" (Jan 2007) "Older Workers’ Preferences for Work & Employ-ment" (Oct 2006) "Elder Caregiving" (Oct 2006)   SEARCH BY keyword: back to top