The "LifeCourse" model, a competing risk cohort microsimulation model: source code and basic concepts of the generic microsimulation programming language Modgen

This paper documents the source code of “LifeCourse”, a simple competing risk microsimulation model initially developed alongside a study on fertility decline in Bulgaria and Russia. “LifeCourse” is programmed in the generic microsimulation language Modgen developed at Statistics Canada. In the context of this contribution, the model is introduced step by step as template for other microsimulation applications and as training tool for demographic microsimulation using Modgen.microsimulation

New mobilities across the lifecourse: a framework for analysing demographically-linked drivers of migration

Migration, along with fertility and mortality, is one of the fundamental drivers of population change. Taking the lifecourse as the central concern, the authors set out a theoretical framework and define some key research questions for a programme of research that explores how the linked lives of mobile people are situated in time-space within the economic, social and cultural structures of contemporary society. Drawing on methodologically innovative techniques, these perspectives can offer conceptually significant and policy relevant insights into the changing nature and meanings of migration across the lifecourse

The Age-shift: observations on social policy, ageism and the dynamics of the adult lifecourse

Through a critical engagement with policy trends, we ask how shifts in ideologies of ageing might influence the possibilities available to adults as they grow older. Of particular interest are the implications for how people are being encouraged to think about the adult lifecourse. We address these questions by looking at policy development, taking the 2000–2005 period in the UK as a case example, and by comparing this period to wider regional and international trends. Finally, we assess the implications of contemporary policy, from a psychodynamic point of view, for the maintenance of a viable identity in later life and for intergenerational relationships

How does money influence health?

This study looks at hundreds of theories to consider how income influences health. There is a graded association between money and health – increased income equates to better health. But the reasons are debated.<p></p> Researchers have reviewed theories from 272 wide-ranging papers, most of which examined the complex interactions between people’s income and their health throughout their lives.<p></p> Key points<p></p> This research identifies four main ways money affects people’s wellbeing:<p></p> Material: Money buys goods and services that improve health. The more money families have, the better the goods they can buy.<p></p> Psychosocial: Managing on a low income is stressful. Comparing oneself to others and feeling at the bottom of the social ladder can be distressing, which can lead to biochemical changes in the body, eventually causing ill health.<p></p> Behavioural: For various reasons, people on low incomes are more likely to adopt unhealthy behaviours – smoking and drinking, for example – while those on higher incomes are more able to afford healthier lifestyles.<p></p> Reverse causation (poor health leads to low income): Health may affect income by preventing people from taking paid employment. Childhood health may also affect educational outcomes, limiting job opportunities and potential earnings

Older and wiser? Men’s and women’s accounts of drinking in early mid-life

Most qualitative research on alcohol focuses on younger rather than older adults. To explore older people’s relationship with alcohol, we conducted eight focus groups with 36 men and women aged 35 to 50 years in Scotland, UK. Initially, respondents suggested that older drinkers consume less alcohol, no longer drink to become drunk and are sociable drinkers more interested in the taste than the effects of alcohol. However, as discussions progressed, respondents collectively recounted recent drunken escapades, challenged accounts of moderate drinking, and suggested there was still peer pressure to drink. Some described how their drinking had increased in mid-life but worked hard discursively to emphasise that it was age and stage appropriate (i.e. they still met their responsibilities as workers and parents). Women presented themselves as staying in control of their drinking while men described going out with the intention of getting drunk (although still claiming to meet their responsibilities). While women experienced peer pressure to drink, they seemed to have more options for socialising without alcohol than did men. Choosing not to drink alcohol is a behaviour that still requires explanation in early mid-life. Harm reduction strategies should pay more attention to drinking in this age group

Not just old and sick - the 'will to health' in later life

The end of the ‘Golden Age’ of welfare capitalism in the 1970s was the prelude to a period of greater individualisation within societies and was accompanied by an increase in the importance of consumption as a way of organising social relations. During the same period there was also an expansion in the discourses aimed at enhancing the government of the autonomous self. One such discourse operates around what has been termed the ‘will to health’: it suggests that health has become a required goal for individual behaviour and has become synonymous with health itself. The generational groups whose lifecourses were most exposed to these changes are now approaching later life. We explore the extent to which social transformations related to risk, consumption and individualisation are reflected in the construction of later-life identities around health and ageing. We examine how the growth in health-related ‘technologies of the self’ have fostered a distinction between natural and normal ageing, wherein the former is associated with coming to terms with physical decline and the latter associated with maintaining norms of self-care aimed at delaying such decline. Finally, we consider anti-ageing medicine as a developing arena for the construction of later-life identities and discuss the implications of the social changes for researching later life

Transitional Labour Markets, from theory to policy application. Transitional Labour Markets and Flexicurity : Managing Social Risks over the Lifecourse

This article presents a conceptual approach related to the European flexicurity debate, the Transitional Labour Market (TLM) theory and its main assumptions. The aim is to bring this analytic framework into the discussion and to clarify some central aspects by defining the key concepts of flexibility and security and by demonstrating the possible interplay of both dimensions. After explaining the empirical assumptions and laying the normative foundation, employment policy strategies following this concept are developed and illustrated by good practices from European member states. It is shown that the TLM-theory is a useful approach, as a comprehensive conceptual system emphasing labour market transitions during the lifecourse.Transitional Labour Markets, employment, flexibility, security.

Transitional labour markets: Managing social risks over the lifecourse

Women and men increasingly face work-related critical events during their lifecourse and experience risks that are not fully covered by unemployment insurance or other work related insurances. Social risk management of transitional labour markets (TLMs) aims at supporting people in navigating risky transitions between various employment relationships or between unpaid (but nevertheless productive) work and gainful employment through social insurance, continuous education or training and employment services differentiated according to the type of risk. This essay outlines the theory of TLMs by starting with a critical review of the concept of flexicurity. It argues that the concept needs theoretical underpinning in order to avoid its arbitrary use for various political interests. It continues by developing the general principles and strategies of social risk management and provides examples on how to successfully manage social risks over the lifecourse in view of the ongoing process of revising the Lisbon strategy. The article ends by recommending the establishment of a worklife insurance consist-ing of three pillars: a universal basic income guarantee, the extension of unemployment insur-ance to employment insurance, supplemented by private or collectively bargained insurance systems. -- Frauen und Männer werden zunehmend mit erwerbsbezogenen kritischen Ereignissen im Lebenslauf konfrontiert. Dabei sind sie Risiken ausgesetzt, die weder durch die Arbeitslosen-versicherung noch durch andere erwerbsbezogene Sicherungssysteme abgedeckt sind. Das soziale Risikomanagement von Übergangsarbeitsmärkten zielt darauf ab, Erwerbspersonen dabei zu unterstützen, erfolgreich durch diese kritischen Übergänge zwischen verschiedenen Beschäftigungsverhältnissen oder zwischen unbezahlter (nichtsdestotrotz produktiver) und bezahlter Arbeit zu navigieren. Es entwickelt neue und nach Risiken differenzierte Formen sozialer Sicherung, beruflicher Weiterbildung und Arbeitsmarktdienstleistungen. Dieser Essay skizziert die Theorie der Übergangsarbeitsmärkte, indem er mit einer kritischen Betrachtung des Konzepts Flexicurity beginnt. Er argumentiert, dass dieses Ansatz einer theoretischen Fundierung bedarf, um seine Verwendung für beliebige politische Zwecke zu vermeiden. Er fährt fort, die allgemeinen Prinzipien und Strategien sozialen Risikomanage-ments zu entwickeln und diese mit praktischen Beispielen unter dem Gesichtspunkt einer Re-vision der Lissabon-Strategie zu erläutern. Der Artikel endet mit der Empfehlung, eine Ar-beitslebensversicherung zu etablieren, die aus drei Säulen besteht: einer universellen Garantie des Mindesteinkommens, einer Erweiterung der Arbeitslosenersicherung zu einer Beschäfti-gungsversicherung, die durch private oder kollektivvertraglich ausgehandelte Versicherungen ergänzt wird.