Author: Lila Schief
Live Poster Session: Zoom Link
Lila Schief
Lila Schief is a Junior at Wesleyan University majoring in American Studies and minoring in Data Analysis. She is interested in public policy, community engagement, and communications. Recently she has done internship work for Age-Friendly DC which is an initiative for the DC government that attempts to make the city a better place in which to grow old.
Abstract: Financial benefits and social norms make retiring in one’s mid-sixties almost compulsory, yet studies from the aughts show that staying employed past the average age of retirement is associated with greater overall happiness (Baker et al., 2005; Schwingel et al., 2009). More recent literature has produced uncertain results on this association (Di Gessa et al., 2017; Anxo et al., 2019; Chia, Hartanto, 2021), and little is known about the impact occupation might have on the potential association. The present study investigates two clarifying questions: Is there a relationship between overall happiness and employment status among Americans aged 60 and above? Does this relationship differ between occupation categories? Analyses in this study are based on the work status, happiness scores, and occupation categories for all respondents aged 60 and older in the 2018 General Social Survey (GSS). An Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) revealed that the average overall happiness of older adults is significantly higher for those who are employed (mean: 6.72, s.d. ± 1.54) than for those who are not employed (Mean=6.33, s.d. ± 1.65), F = 8.47, p = 0.0037. This association was still statistically significant when controlling for occupation category, and occupation is independently related to overall happiness. The mean happiness score for people aged 60 and above in occupation category 1 (management, professional, and related occupations) is significantly higher than the happiness score for all other categories. The mean happiness score does not differ significantly between the other occupation categories. These findings show that regardless of occupation, older adults who stay employed as they age might be happier on average than those who retire.
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