November 6, 2012

Kosice University, Slovakia

The Seminar at Kosice University

by Asghar Zaidi

On behalf of the project team at European Centre Vienna: Katrin Gasior, Maria M. Hofmarcher, Orsolya Lelkes, Bernd Marin, Ricardo Rodrigues, Andrea Schmidt, Pieter Vanhuysse, Eszter Zolyomi and Michael Fuchs

First Results on Active Ageing Indicators and Active Ageing Index (AAI) for EU-27 Countries

Work-in-Progress, subject to further revisions.

The background: EC-sponsored UNECE / ECV Project

.... the ‘Active Ageing Index’ (AAI) project is a jointly-managed research project between European Commission, UNECE and ECV; undertaken within the framework of activities of the EY2012 and marking the 2nd cycle of review and appraisal of the implementation of MIPAA / RIS.

Its aims are:.... to develop and launch an Active Ageing Index (AAI) measuring outcomes

of economic and social activity and independent and healthy living of older people as well as measuring the capacity for active ageing across EU/ UNECE countries.

.... the AAI is expected to serve as an evidence tool to monitor active ageing outcomes as well as potential at the country level, with a breakdown by gender, for mutual learning and advocacy of most appropriate policy implementation.

This work is undertaken:

… in consultation with the UNECE Expert Group, which includes many distinguished international experts on active ageing and intergenerational relationships, from UNECE, European Commission, OECD, academia and civil society organisations as well as from Eurostat and national statistical agencies (UK, IT) and also representatives of policymakers (BE).

… (also) to work with the UNECE’s Working Group on Ageing, formed by UNECE’s Member States in 2008.

The progress made so far:

… (July/August 2012) completion of the first results paper ‘Towards an Active Ageing Index: Concept, Methodology and First Results’ bringing out the first full set of results on individual indicators, and their aggregation into a gender-specific index for 27 EU Member States;

… (August 2012) presentation made of first results at the World Demographic and Ageing (WDA) Forum, St Gallen, Switzerland;

… (September 2012) presentation at the side event of the Ministerial Conference: Ensuring a society for all ages: promoting quality of life and active ageing, (20th September 2012, Vienna, Austria)

Three parts of the presentation ...

1. Concept and methodology1.1 The conceptual choices and the novelty 1.2 Selection of indicators and domains

2. First results (domain-specific indices and the overall AAI)

2.0 Ranking of countries by the overall index, AAI 2.1 The 1st domain results: ‘Contribution through paid activities / employment’ 2.2 The 2nd domain results: ‘Contribution through unpaid activities’ 2.3 The 3rd domain results: ‘Independent and autonomous living’ 2.4 The 4th domain results: ‘Capacity for active ageing / enabling environment’ 2.5 The overall index (AAI) and its decomposition across four domains

3. Conclusions

The concept and methodology

Part 1

1.1 The conceptual choices

Definition (aligned with the EY2012 principles): Active ageing refers to phenomenon in which, with rising life expectancy on average, people are expected and allowed to continue to active longer in the formal labour market as well as in unpaid productive activities (such as care provision to family members and volunteering) and live healthy, independent and autonomous lives in their older ages.

Novelty (arising from recommendations of the EG recommendations): The AA measurement divided into two broadly defined dimensions:

a) actual experiences of active ageing (by countries and subgroups within countries)

b) capacity / ability to actively age (that can still be tapped to improve their quality of life and to make public welfare systems more sustainable)

1.1 The conceptual choices

The gender disaggregation has been emphasised, to understand better the actual experiences in the context of cultures and institutional differences across European countries as well as in measuring potential for active ageing.

1.2 Selection criteria for indicators choice

1. Outcome indicators, instead of input or process indicators

2. International comparability within EU27 countries thus ruling out indicators drawn from national data sources

3. Coverage of countries the minimum syndicale to be EU27 coverage; data for the

most recent year

4. Replicability of results essential, not necessarily annual; should rule out use of special module!

5. Access to micro datasets SILC and ESS not an issue, and LFS will also be accessible,

though with a time lag

6. Data quality considerationse.g. Subjective variables subject to cultural bias, thus used only

when absolutely essential and with caution!

7. Seeking to measure ‘unrealised potential’.... the work undertaken can be seen as a stock taking exercise

for member countries for policy reforms!

8. Assigning normative value judgement.... developing ‘positive’ indicators, with the clear interpretation

of “more-is-better”;

9. Disaggregating indicators, by gender/age.... Gender sub-division most desirable; further considerations for disaggregation by age groups whenever necessary (lower age limit 55)

10.Parsimony over number of indicators selected .... and smart use of left out indicators for the ‘contextual analyses’ in the follow-up project.

1.2 Selection criteria for indicators choice

Selected indicators and their domains

First results (Overall AAI and Domain-specific indices)

Part 2

2.0 Ranking of countries by the overall index, AAIOverall ranking (first panel) and differentials for men and women (2nd and 3rd panel)

2.1 Index for the 1st domain: Employment Overall ranking (first panel) and differentials for men and women (2nd and 3rd panel)

-100%

-80%

-60%

-40%

-20%

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%Job satisfaction, 55-64

Employment rate, 70-74

Employment rate, 65-69

Employment rate, 60-64

Employment rate, 55-59

Decomposition of the Employment indexContribution of five indicators to the domain-specific index (total)

2.2 Index for the 2nd domain: Unpaid activities Overall ranking (first panel) and differentials for men and women (2nd and 3rd panel)

2.3 Index for the 3rd domain: Independent livingOverall ranking (first panel) and differentials for men and women (2nd and 3rd panel)

2.4 Index for the 4th domain: Capacity for AAOverall ranking (first panel) and differentials for men and women (2nd and 3rd panel)

Conclusions

3

Early observations... / Conclusions

• Several quite interesting and surprising results, and the methodology adopted provide strong insights into policy implementation required (due principally to its comparative aspects but also due to the decomposition exercise).

• Nordic countries do very well in the overall index (mainly for their good placement in the 3rd and 4th domain); FI stands out when comparing actual outcomes to the capacity of active ageing.

• CEECs in general are ranked low (also PT and EL), largely due to a low capacity of active ageing in these countries. Nonetheless, LV, BG and EL are seen to under-perform in comparison to their capacity for active ageing.

Early observations... / Conclusions• Southern European countries do better for men than for women (e.g. results for CY),

especially in the 1st and 2nd domains (this may partly be due to an under-recording of informal contributions of women in these societies).

• Gender differences in ranking scores become visibly smaller in the Index for the 3rd and 4th domain when compared to index values on unpaid activities and employment.

• Interesting aspect is the heterogeneity across different dimensions of active ageing (e.g. paid vs. unpaid work) – worth exploring in the future how institutional differences (such as tax-benefit systems) may have contributed to these differences!

• Methodological choices made also crucial for the policy insights…., there remains issues to be resolved (e.g. equal weights for all domains; missing values for some indicators, etc. ?) – comments and observations from the EG will be most useful in this respect!

StrengthsA transparent numerical exercise, with a potential to provide

strong policy insights in the current context of ageing societies and their policy reform challenges

Caveats The coverage and replicability requirements of the AAI have identified

critical data gaps (especially in non-EU countries)

Essential future research ... Contextual analysis towards identifying sources of cross-national

differences is essential work in this area... Important to link active ageing experiences to positive outcomes

(e.g. how and what forms of active ageing raise QOL of individuals concerned? What impact of active ageing discourse on the financial /social sustainability of public welfare systems?)

For more detailed analysis, see

Towards an Active Ageing IndexConcept, Methodology and First Results

By

Asghar Zaidi, Katrin Gasior, Maria M. Hofmarcher, Orsolya Lelkes, Bernd Marin, Ricardo Rodrigues, Andrea Schmidt, Pieter

Vanhuysse and Eszter Zolyomi

European Centre ViennaJuly 2012