Increasing life expectancies and uncertainty about future retirement incomes are likely to lead to various changes in behaviour. As expectations are revised, one potentially important adjustment mechanism is in labour force participation rates. There is already evidence these are rising for...

This paper aims to quantify some of the costs associated with ill health in New Zealand. The main focus is in estimating indirect costs as opposed to direct health care expenditure costs. In particular, it estimates the cost of absenteeism, presenteeism, working less and not working at all owing...

This paper examines the relationship between health and labour force participation using data from the first three waves of the Survey of Family, Income and Employment (SoFIE) (2002/05). Using various health measures, the results show that health is significantly related to labour force...

This paper analyses the relationship between net wealth and health using Waves 1 to 3 of the Survey of Family, Income and Employment (SoFIE). The results show that lower net wealth is associated with worse health over a range of differing measures of health. The paper acknowledges but does not...

Health status is an important element in the decision to continue working or retire among older workers. Given the demographic projections for the next four decades, there will be increasing opportunities for older workers to remain in the workforce. However, an individual’s decision is likely...