The bar charts provide information about the proportion of older men and women aged 60-64 who were employed in four different countries in 1970 and 2000.
It is clear that a significantly larger proportion of the older generation in 1970 was employed compared to people in the same age group in 2000. Further, the elderly in the United States had the highest employment rate compared to the other countries on the list.
Starting with 1970, most people aged 60-64 were in work. It is clear that men were more active than women in all four countries on the list. Almost all men aged 60-64 were employed in the United States, accounting for about 85%, while almost 80% of older women from the same country were working. Indonesia ranked second, with nearly 85% of men and around 65% of women in employment. It was followed by Belgium, where the proportion of employed men was slightly lower, at nearly 80%. Meanwhile, the figure for Belgian women aged 60-64 was identical to that of their Indonesian counterparts. The employment rate in Japan was the lowest, but only with a negligible difference compared with Belgium and Indonesia, at about 75% for men and 55% for women.
In 2000, the employment rate of people aged 60-64 plummeted in all four countries. Older men in the United States were still the dominant category, making up almost 80%, while the figure for women fell markedly to around 42%. Indonesia remained the second-highest, with approximately 72% of men and exactly half of women in employment. By contrast, the proportion of employed men in both Belgium and Japan stood at just over 50%. However, Japan recorded a considerably higher figure for women, at about 48%, compared with a mere 8% in Belgium, making the latter the country with the lowest employment rate among older people.