Our World
in Data
Oxford Martin School logoUniversity of Oxford logoGlobal Change Data Lab logo
Data

Labor force participation rate of men aged 65+ in the United States

About this data

Source
Short and OECD (2017) – processed by Our World in Data
Last updated
April 22, 2017
Date range
1850–2015
Unit
%

Sources and processing

This data is based on the following sources

Short and OECD – Labor force participation rates of men age 65 and over in the US

The source for the period 1880 to 1990 is Short, Joanna (2002) – "Economic History of Retirement in the United States". EH.Net Encyclopedia, edited by Robert Whaples. September 30, 2002. URL http://eh.net/encyclopedia/economic-history-of-retirement-in-the-united-states/

This data is based on these three sources: – Moen, Jon R. Essays on the Labor Force and Labor Force Participation Rates: The United States from 1860 through 1950. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Chicago, 1987. – Costa, Dora L. The Evolution of Retirement: An American Economic History, 1880-1990. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998. – Bureau of Labor Statistics

Data for 2000 to 2015 is from the OECD [OECD.stat web browser – Source: http://stats.oecd.org/viewhtml.aspx?datasetcode=LFS_SEXAGE_I_R&lang=en Labor force participation of men 65 and older from the OECD – http://stats.oecd.org/viewhtml.aspx?datasetcode=LFS_SEXAGE_I_R&lang=en]"

Data for 2000 is available from both sources and the discrepancy is minor so that we decided to merge the data as presented in the sources. Short reports 17.5% while the OECD reports 17.73% for 2000.

Retrieved on
April 22, 2017
Retrieved from
http://eh.net/encyclopedia/economic-history-of-retirement-in-the-united-states/
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
Our World in Data based on Short (2002) and OECD (2017). Labor force participation rates of men age 65 and over in the US.

The source for the period 1880 to 1990 is Short, Joanna (2002) – "Economic History of Retirement in the United States". EH.Net Encyclopedia, edited by Robert Whaples. September 30, 2002. URL http://eh.net/encyclopedia/economic-history-of-retirement-in-the-united-states/

This data is based on these three sources: – Moen, Jon R. Essays on the Labor Force and Labor Force Participation Rates: The United States from 1860 through 1950. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Chicago, 1987. – Costa, Dora L. The Evolution of Retirement: An American Economic History, 1880-1990. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998. – Bureau of Labor Statistics

Data for 2000 to 2015 is from the OECD [OECD.stat web browser – Source: http://stats.oecd.org/viewhtml.aspx?datasetcode=LFS_SEXAGE_I_R&lang=en Labor force participation of men 65 and older from the OECD – http://stats.oecd.org/viewhtml.aspx?datasetcode=LFS_SEXAGE_I_R&lang=en]"

Data for 2000 is available from both sources and the discrepancy is minor so that we decided to merge the data as presented in the sources. Short reports 17.5% while the OECD reports 17.73% for 2000.

Retrieved on
April 22, 2017
Retrieved from
http://eh.net/encyclopedia/economic-history-of-retirement-in-the-united-states/
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
Our World in Data based on Short (2002) and OECD (2017). Labor force participation rates of men age 65 and over in the US.

How we process data at Our World in Data

All data and visualizations on Our World in Data rely on data sourced from one or several original data providers. Preparing this original data involves several processing steps. Depending on the data, this can include standardizing country names and world region definitions, converting units, calculating derived indicators such as per capita measures, as well as adding or adapting metadata such as the name or the description given to an indicator.

At the link below you can find a detailed description of the structure of our data pipeline, including links to all the code used to prepare data across Our World in Data.

Read about our data pipeline

Reuse this work

  • All data produced by third-party providers and made available by Our World in Data are subject to the license terms from the original providers. Our work would not be possible without the data providers we rely on, so we ask you to always cite them appropriately (see below). This is crucial to allow data providers to continue doing their work, enhancing, maintaining and updating valuable data.
  • All data, visualizations, and code produced by Our World in Data are completely open access under the Creative Commons BY license. You have the permission to use, distribute, and reproduce these in any medium, provided the source and authors are credited.

Citations

How to cite this page

To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:

“Data Page: Labor force participation rate of men aged 65+ in the United States”. Our World in Data (2026). Data adapted from Short and OECD. Retrieved from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20260511-092124/grapher/labor-force-participation-rate-of-men-65-years-and-older-in-the-usa.html [online resource] (archived on May 11, 2026).

How to cite this data

In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:

Short and OECD (2017) – processed by Our World in Data

Full citation

Short and OECD (2017) – processed by Our World in Data. “Labor force participation rate of men aged 65+ in the United States” [dataset]. Short and OECD, “Labor force participation rates of men age 65 and over in the US” [original data]. Retrieved May 11, 2026 from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20260511-092124/grapher/labor-force-participation-rate-of-men-65-years-and-older-in-the-usa.html (archived on May 11, 2026).

Download

Quick download

You can download the visualization as an image or download the chart data.