November 2025
07Nov

Determinants of financial inclusion among women-owned enterprises: a case study of the informal sector

By Faizan Khan Sherwani, Sanaa Zafar Shaikh, Shilpa Behal & Mohd Shuaib Siddiqui The purpose of this paper is to analyse the determinants of financial inclusion among women-owned informal enterprises in India. The study is based on a primary survey of 321 informal enterprises. The data has been collected through a structured questionnaire. A chi-square test has been used to examine the significant association between the characteristics of informal enterprises and their owners and financial inclusion. A logistic regression model...

November 7, 2025
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October 2025
28Oct

Rising birth rates no longer tied to economic prosperity

Fertility rates began falling in most of the world starting in the last century. By the 1970s, the U.S. had dipped under the replacement rate of 2.1 children per woman, a trend that has continued on a declining slope. In her new working paper, “The Downside of Fertility,” Claudia Goldin, the Henry Lee Professor of Economics, takes a deeper dive into the cultural changes around gender that are driving down fertility rates. The economic historian and 2023 Nobel laureate introduced a model in a previous...

October 28, 2025
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24Oct

Kenya’s pension paradox: Growth amid low coverage

The third edition of the East African Pensions Conference and Expo opened in Nairobi on Thursday with a call to widen Kenyan’s pension coverage and curb old age poverty. Hosted by the Nation Media Group (NMG), the annual event has become the region’s platform for policy shifts to increase the number of East Africans saving for a pension and boost the value of payouts at retirement. Official data show more than 80 percent of senior citizens work for basic items, raising...

October 24, 2025
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23Oct

Over 7,000 Mozambicans working in South Africa will start receiving pensions, social security benefits in Mozambique

The Mozambican Minister of Labour, Ivete Alane, has announced that as of next year over 7,000 Mozambican nationals working in South Africa will start receiving their pensions in the country. According to Alane, who was speaking on Tuesday at the opening ceremony of the National Meeting on Migrant Labour, which is taking place in Macaneta, Marracuene district, southern province of Maputo, the workers will receive their social security benefits in the country, without worrying about resorting to South Africa. “The social...

October 23, 2025
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09Oct

The Paradox of Demographic Dividend: Ageing Population and the Gig Economy

As I travel from my office in Dal Gate towards Jawahar Nagar, in Srinagar, a 24-year-old food delivery rider parks his scooter in front of a coaching centre. He has just completed his third order of the morning and is checking his phone for the next one. His father, meanwhile, spent three decades as a government schoolteacher, drawing a steady salary and retiring with a pension that still sustains the family. The contrast could not be sharper: the father’s...

October 9, 2025
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08Oct

The U.S.-Born labor force will shrink over the next decade

By Josh Bivens It is often underrecognized how much population aging is currently reducing the growth rate of the U.S. labor force and will continue to pull it down in coming decades. The share of the population that is over the age of 65 (when labor force participation tends to take a steep fall on average) is rising rapidly. This share was 12.4% in 2007, 17.9% in 2024, and will hit 21.2% by 2035 (CBO 2025b). A recent EPI report...

October 8, 2025
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03Oct

Part-Time Penalties and Heterogeneous Retirement Decisions

By Kanta Ogawa Older male workers exhibit diverse retirement behaviors across occupations and respond differently to policy changes, influenced significantly by the part-time penalty—wage reduction faced by part-time workers compared to their full-time counterparts. Many older individuals reduce their working hours, and in occupations with high part-time penalties, they tend to retire earlier, as observed in data from Japan and the United States. This study develops a general equilibrium model that incorporates occupational choices, endogenous labor supply, highlighting that the...

October 3, 2025
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03Oct

Population Aging in ASEAN+3: But is 60 the New 40?

By Aruhan Rui Shi & Hongyan Zhao Population aging is becoming a significant concern, particularly as its pace accelerates, especially in emerging market economies. However, labeling all individuals aged 65 and above as elderly can be misleading and inaccurate when life expectancy is increasing. Therefore, using the prospective old-age dependency ratio to define what is elderly would allow for more precise measurements and facilitate research into the impact of aging on economic growth. Our findings suggest that while a negative...

October 3, 2025
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01Oct

Healthy ageing: Are we on track?

The world is ageing at an unprecedented pace. The change in global demography caused by population ageing has been a notable phenomenon in recent times. The global population of people aged 60 and above is expected to increase from 1.1 billion in 2023 to 1.4 billion in 2030. Moreover, the pace of population ageing has been significantly faster than in the past, with an estimated increase in the proportion of older people in the global population from 12% to 22% between 2015 and 2050. Between 1974...

October 1, 2025
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September 2025
30Sep

The global imperative of investing in healthy aging

Observed on October 1 of each year, International Day of Older Persons recognizes the contributions of older adults and raises awareness of the challenges they may face. As the world undergoes a profound demographic shift with increasing life expectancies, many communities lack the structures or opportunities that allow the older population to thrive. Societies are confronted with a once-in-a-generation choice: reimagine systems to support longevity for all or risk stagnation with outdated structures. “Improving the quality of life for older individuals and...

September 30, 2025
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