Comparative Analysis of the Changing Educational Composition of the Elderly Population in Five Asian Countries: A Preliminary Report

Projected increases in both the absolute and the relative size of the elderly population of many third world countries is a subject of growing concern for social policy (Treas and Logue, 1986; Grigsby, 1991). These increases are the result of changing fertility and mortality regimes over the last 40 years. Despite the growing awareness of recent and impending increases, few empirical assessments have been made of the accompanying compositional changes that might be expected in these elderly populations, or to the historical and dynamic aspects of cohort succession which give rise to these changes. This paper introduces a comparative analysis of recent and projected levels of literacy and educational attainment of males and females age 60 and older in five Asian countries, including Taiwan, Thailand, Singapore, the Philippines, and South Korea for the period between 1980 and 2020. The analysis is based on the educational characteristics of successive birth cohorts from the first half of the twentieth century (i.e. 1900-1960) as measured circa 1980. The projections in this analysis indicate that each of the Asian countries in this study have entered into an era in which the educational composition of the elderly population is undergoing significant and rapid change. Moreover, the educational composition of the elderly population will continue to change rapidly for at least the next twenty five years. A change in the educational composition of the elderly population is in itself significant because it implies a change in both the type of human resources and the type of needs or demands which the elderly represent to a society. But the continually changing educational character of the elderly population also has significant implications for the timeliness of policy planning.

Despite a common theme of constant and rapid change in the educational composition of the elderly populations, the cross-national comparisons reveal distinctions in the nature and pace of this change. These distinctions reflect each country's earlier twentieth century experiences with the expanding educational systems to which the cohorts that will constitute future elderly populations were exposed at a younger age.

Dataset(s): Census: Taiwan, 1980. Census: Singapore, 1980. Census: Thailand, 1980. Census: Philippines, 1980. Census: South Korea, 1985.