The U.N.’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) track more than 230 performance indicators to determine progress in social, economic and environmental sustainability in countries around the world, yet older adults are hardly mentioned. While there are several indicators that document the progress of population subgroups, no indicator specifically targets older adults.
In an illuminating class on sustainability indicators—taught by Alexander de Sherbinin, director of the Center for Integrated Earth Science Information Network at the Columbia Climate School, and Zachary A. Wendling, a research director at the Yale Center for Environmental Law & Policy, who co-authored the popular Environmental Performance Index—I learned how to analyze existing indexes and how to construct my own. The Aging Planet Index (API) is a culmination of these efforts.
First, I thought it was worth questioning why older adults are not a staple in the SDGs. Perhaps aging societies are not a global challenge? After all, the world population continues its relentless upward climb, expected to peak only by the mid-2080s. But if we dig deeper, we see that the 65-and-over age group exhibits the fastest growth rate. Developing countries—where population growth is concentrated—are under great pressure as they face an unprecedented double burden. Since they are aging more rapidly than developed countries did in their early developmental stage, they cannot follow the playbook of first focusing on economic development, before ramping up healthcare systems to manage old-age chronic diseases.
While several institutions have already constructed aging indexes, they largely reflect policymakers’ viewpoints. In the Active Ageing Index by the U.N. Economic Commission for Europe, the variable of employment rate in ages 70–74 is the most glaring. Who decided working from 70–74 was desirable? When I created the API’s foundational framework, I chose to reflect what older adults actually want. A global WHO survey of older adults concluded that “having energy, being happy, having well-functioning senses and being free from pain.” Broadly, they care about happiness and good health. As such, the first component of the API tracks wellbeing via self-reported wellbeing and healthy life expectancy.
Next, I considered which means are critical to achieve these ends. For wellbeing, economic security is arguably the most important facilitator; this became component two of the API. Instead of using employment rate in old age, I opted for pension coverage and old-age poverty to better capture choice. We may not agree on what age is retirement-ideal, but we can agree that having sufficient money is universally desired. Economic security is closely tied to psychological security—for instance, people may continue working beyond retirement for social interactions and meaning; so I also included self-reported measures of social support and feelings of productivity.
“Perhaps aging societies are not a global challenge? After all, the world population continues its relentless upward climb, expected to peak only by the mid-2080s. But if we dig deeper, we see that the 65-and-over age group exhibits the fastest growth rate.”
Finally, component three of the API brings attention to the environment, which is overlooked in many indexes despite being central to wellbeing. In the Global Burden of Diseases study, deaths caused by pollution were found to be “much greater than that of war, terrorism, malaria, HIV, tuberculosis, drugs, and alcohol.” Moreover, such environmental impacts are disproportionately borne by older adults who are more susceptible. Yet the environment is often underprioritized across governments and international organizations, arguably because it is difficult to measure. I used the variables of air pollution exposure, lead exposure and years lost to extreme weather events.
After gathering measures for these criteria, I standardized the values for my nine variables into a common scale (0–1) to allow comparison. For each country, we averaged the 9 variable scores to obtain the final index score (0–1). Countries were then ranked based on this final score.
Across 140 countries, the top 20 were dominated by Northern and Western Europe. The API appears to reflect the countries’ global economic rankings (they are highly correlated with GDP per capita), which is expected as economic resources help facilitate healthcare and social welfare systems that in turn increase wellbeing, security and environmental resilience. That said, I tested various explanatory factors outlined in prior investigations and found stronger correlations—at all income levels—driven by gender inequality and universal health coverage.
Women accumulate burdens throughout their life, such as experiencing workplace discrimination and bearing the brunt of caregiving, which can manifest as wide disparities in old age. One solution to consider is strengthening women’s power in society, as India’s experiment with reserving village council seats for women in the 1990s did, may lead to structural investments in-tune with women’s needs. Amartya Sen, an economist and philosopher who has championed human development, has demonstrated that a country does not need to wait for economic prosperity before improving healthcare and educational opportunities upstream; countries have achieved them with far less.
Ultimately, I hope the API will kickstart discourse over the aging challenge: which dimensions of successful aging should we prioritize, and what potential solutions can we provide?
Ng Kah Long is a graduate student in Columbia University’s Quantitative Methods in the Social Sciences program. His research interests lie in bridging social science disciplines to solve interesting problems. He is currently a research assistant at Columbia’s Mailman School of Public Health.
Views and opinions expressed here are those of the authors, and do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Columbia Climate School, Earth Institute or Columbia University.
