The major purpose of this study was to examine the effects of socio-economic status (SES) on changes in functional abilities, as measured by Activities of Daily Living (ADL) scales, among older people in Taiwan. A prospective longitudinal study design was used. A panel of 874 community-dwelling older people were followed over four years (1994 to 1998). Three SES indicators, education, having ‘extra’ money (more than required for basic necessities), and principal lifetime occupation were included in separate multiple logistic regression models of functional change in physical ADL (PADL) and in instrumental ADL (IADL). Over the four years, the study cohort experienced greater decreases in IADL functioning than in PADL functioning. Having ‘extra’ money was significantly and negatively associated with PADL decline, while level of education had a strong positive relationship with IADL functioning. In addition to SES, age was significantly associated with PADL and IADL functioning change. The paper also reports a comparison of similar findings from several eastern and western countries. This has established that among the available SES indicators, the level of education has most consistently been shown in both eastern and western population studies to be related to health and health change, and that self-perceived economic resource is also related to older people's health in Asian populations.

This article reports the findings of research into the functioning of companies' and organisations' internal labour markets. Four case studies of Australian and United Kingdom public and private sector organisations have been undertaken with two principal aims: to elucidate the challenges and barriers to the employment of older workers, and to demonstrate the benefits to business and to older workers of age-aware human resource management policies. In each of the case-study organisations, age-related assumptions affected the management of knowledge and skills and the ways in which older and younger workers were employed. Managing age relations in organisations requires an understanding of the ways in which workers of different ages are perceived and how these associate with sub-optimal deployment. The article concludes by suggesting that policies directed at older workers alone will ignore the age and age-group dynamics that pervade workplaces. To promote the better deployment of younger and older individuals in rapidly transforming organisations, there is a need for policy makers, employers and employees to be attentive to the age-group relationships that currently inform workplace practices. Organisations cannot ignore these age dynamics, but should adopt ‘age aware’ rather than ‘age free’ practices. The recommended human-resources approach would attend to individuals' capabilities and not stereotype them by age.