US : As It Ages, Virginia’s Work Force Remains on the Job

The number of people in Virginia’s work force age 65 or over increased by 24 percent from 1998 to 2002, the U.S. Census Bureau reported today. ; During this same period, the number in the work force that were under age 65 grew by only 3 percent. The analysis of Virginia’s older workers is based on the Local Employment Dynamics (LED) program <http://lehd.dsd.census.gov>.

The report, A Profile of Older Workers in Virginia [PDF], highlights the age composition of the state’s work force, job gains and losses for older workers by industry, industries in which older workers are concentrated and their job stability and earnings.

« With these new data we can see trends develop each quarter within a state or substate area, in what industries the changes occur and the characteristics of workers involved in the changes, » Census Bureau Director Louis Kincannon said. « These indicators give new insight into Virginia’s economy and how fluid and strong employment is in its communities. »

Some highlights from the Virginia report:

— In 2002, industries in which more than 1-in-5 workers were 55 or older included museums, galleries and gardens; apparel from fabrics and local and suburban transit. ; Each of these industries employed more than 1,200 older workers.

— Industries where workers 65 or older were most likely to be employed were in business services, health services and eating and drinking places.

— Legal services was an industry with a low turnover rate for workers 55 or older, while agricultural services had a high turnover rate.

— Among industries in 2002 that employed more than 500 people 65 or older, the highest-paying was engineering, accounting and research, which had average earnings of $4,820 per month.

— The industry with the highest average monthly earnings in 2002 for workers 65 or older was security and commodity brokers ($8,666). But the number of such workers in this age group was only 282.

— On average, among workers 65 and over, 6,104 jobs were created and 9,544 were lost in 2002.

The LED consists of individual partnerships between 29 states and the Census Bureau. Reports prepared jointly with the partner states on a variety of topics will be released over the upcoming months. ; The Department of Health and Human Services’ National Institute on Aging, a component of the National Institutes of Health, funded the report.

In addition, quarterly work force indicators such as job creation and new hires are currently available for Virginia and several other partner states for selected years, age groups and geographic areas, as well as for men and women at <http://lehd.dsd.census.gov>.

Because the statistics come from a variety of sources, including state administrative records, they are not directly comparable with statistics from household surveys such as the decennial census long form, the American Community Survey and the Current Population Survey. Industries are organized by the Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) system. The LED program will soon move from the SIC system to the North American Industry Classification System. As in all data-estimation processes, the results are subject to error, such as those arising from data processing or incomplete records. The Census Bureau uses a variety of procedures to minimize such errors.