Income, Assets, and Poverty: Older Women in Comparative Perspective

Abstract

We analyze the economic well‐being of older women in cross‐national perspective, comparing the United States with four other high‐income countries: the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, and Sweden. We report some of the first findings based on microdata from a new source, the Luxembourg Wealth Study (LWS). The LWS, a project within the larger Luxembourg Income Study (LIS), is a database containing harmonized wealth datasets from a number of industrialized countries. Using the LWS data, we analyze the income and wealth packages held by women, aged 60 and older, across these five countries. We begin by assessing employment, income, and wealth outcomes, first among all older women's households and, second, in one particularly vulnerable group: older women who live alone. We then turn our attention to poor older women and, finally, to those who are extremely poor. We close with brief comments about policy implications and further research.