Journals of Gerontology Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, Vol 51, Issue 3 S111-S120, Copyright © 1996 by The Gerontological Society of America
Differentials in active life expectancy in the older population of the United States
EM Crimmins, MD Hayward and Y Saito
Andrus Gerontology Center, University of Southern California, USA. crimmin@almaak.usc.edu
This study clarifies the process by which mortality and disability interact
to determine differences in active life expectancy by age, sex, race, and
education for the U.S. population 70 years of age and over. The analysis is
performed using data from the Longitudinal Study of Aging and multistate
life tables constructed using the results of hazard models. Women spend
more years than men both active and inactive at every age; however, the
proportion of life that is expected to be active is smaller for women.
These differences are largely due to mortality differences favoring women.
Persons with less than a high school education have shorter total and
active life expectancies but similar expected lengths of inactive life
compared to those with more than a high school education. There are no
significant race differences in total life expectancy for race-education
groups of the older population; but Blacks have lower expected active life
than non-Blacks because of worse functioning.
