Continuities in Providing for Old Age: Cross‐national and Cross‐cultural Comparisons
Drawing on a purposive sample of 25 interviews supplemented by secondary source material, this comparative study explores the options available to elderly immigrants in two quite similar countries to achieve social security in their old age. The focus is the culturally determined perspectives and practices of aging Italian-born and Indian-born immigrants in the context of public and private sector social welfare policies and provisions in Australia and Canada. Government transfers, occupational superannuation, tax-deductible personal savings, housing, and formal and informal supports are discussed. What is important to the sense of social security of the older people and how well-off or disadvantaged they seem to be are among the questions raised. The design affords an opportunity to test the complex combination of cross-national and cross-cultural comparison. In the certainty that the income deficiencies of today's elderly immigrants cannot be remedied easily or quickly enough to benefit those affected, intervention strategies can be aimed at expanding ethno-specific community supports and quality residential care; such a direction is supported by assessment of service availability in relation to estimates of aging among particular foreign-born immigrant groups. Suggestions are made for future research at the levels of theory and application. Copyright 1993 by The Policy Studies Organization.
Poverty and Pensions
It has been argued that it is impossible to measure poverty among elderly people because pension levels and poverty lines are so similar. Whether poverty among them appears to be high or low may depend upon an arbitrary decision as to whether the poverty line should be a dollar a week above or below the age pension. This paper analyses poverty among elderly people suggesting that it can be measured by the number who live below an after-housing cost poverty line. That is, their poverty should be measured after they have paid for their housing. This procedure not only avoids some of the measurement problems, it also provides a more realistic test of the level of poverty in Australia than other techniques. It takes into account not only the incomes of families but also their ownership of the main form of household wealth — the family home. 
 
 
 
In general when poverty is measured in this way its incidence is much lower among elderly people than others. An important reason is the widespread ownership of homes among the elderly which reduces their housing outlays. Among a minority of the elderly, the private-sector renters, the incidence of after-housing poverty is however very high.
Is there a gray peril? Retirement politics in Florida.
Using data from Florida, the most significant destination for Sunbelt retirees, three hypotheses concerning the political impact of retirement migration on the Sunbelt were tested. Surveys of local government officials and socioeconomic data about local government regarding 103 municipalities and 62 counties suggested that aging persons, although politically active, are seldom involved in organized advocacy or political opposition to local policies that are largely beneficial to other interests.