Health impairments are significantly higher in the male aging veterans as compared with non-veterans. In the age class 65 to 74 in the year ending June 30, 1958, the rate of impairments per 1,000 veterans was found in a National Health Survey to be 518 as compared with 421 for non-veterans in this age class. Similarly, the proportion of aging male veterans was higher than for nonveterans for those with chronic conditions, those under care with restricted activity and the number of days of bed disability. Currently available data are inadequate, however, to provide more precise information on this score. Special economic effects on aging veterans The effects of this changing health factor on employment have a great many facets of direct specific bearing on the economics of the individual veteran aged 65 and over in addition to those mentioned in general above, as well as on prospective employers and on income maintenance programs of Government agencies. The 65 and over veteran group differs on this score from the general non-veteran male population in this age group in several ways of special importance to government and private planning agencies concerned. The development of some major disability impairments in the case of veterans resulted from wartime military service which brought large numbers into the wholly and partially disabled classification suddenly with each major military episode, rather than at the more normal non-veteran accretion rate. This has had widespread special economic effects through the necessity of providing expanded treatment facilities and services in large volume inaugurated in short periods of time, the economic maintenance of those with impaired or destroyed self-support ability, and restoration where possible to full or partial selfsupport condition, occupation and employment. The effect of these developments on the veteran population aged 65 and over are apparent in the periodic expansion heretofore mentioned in their number and the influence on employment income. (In the latter case, it is well to note that it is possible to have somewhat misleading statistical indications of improving average health condition and of increased employment for the aging veteran group as a whole in these periods of extraordinary expansion in the numbers of those reaching age 65, since those who are just entering the 65 and older age group are typically in better physical condition than the average for the existing group, and have a relatively higher rate of employment than does the group as a whole.) Physical condition and employability Physical condition of the aging is a factor in the decision by the prospective employer and the aging man himself as to whether to offer or take employment in specific cases and at particular times. It affects employability and the type of work that can be performed and as might be expected is of a somewhat lower level in a greater proportion of aging veterans than is the case with non-veterans. In the 65 to 74 age group, about 45 percent of the veterans have some type of activity restriction involving work limitation as compared with about a third in the case of nonveterans. Information currently available is inadequate to get a clear measure of the developments within the 65 and over age period as a basis for determining precisely what, if any, Government measures would be helpful to maintaining the aging veteran for a longer period in suitable physical condition to take advantage of available employment opportunities. Consideration is being given currently to this situation. The outcome of this background in the actual employment situation of the aging veteran is presented in Chapter III. Research in Maintaining the Health of Aging Veterans The Veterans Administration has currently in progress about 90 studies in the following fields directly concerned with the health problems of the aging and having a bearing on the maintenance of the aging veteran currently and in the future in a viable economic condition. They cover the following areas of study: (a) Biological aspects of aging in the cell, the organ and the organism (b) Changes which age produces in the individual (c) Special deterioration usually attributed to age or specially noted in elderly patients These are a continuation of the general program of the Veterans Administration in this field and are concerned particularly with the ultimate prevention or early cure of conditions which impair the health and ability of the aging veteran to maintain himself. EDUCATION BACKGROUND The current aging population, including veterans, has not had as many years of formal education as is now customary. The median school years completed for those now 65 years of age and over is slightly over 8 as compared with 12 for those now under 45. The education status of the aging population of the future will increasingly reflect the general continuing rise in the average number of years of formal schooling of the younger generations. With particular reference to veterans, this has resulted in part from the fact that those veterans now in the 65 and over age group did not have the advantage of the educational assistance, including retraining and readaptation to new employment provided after World War II and the Korean Conflict. This has had some bearing both on employment of the veterans who are now in the population group aged 65 and over and on their resources for satisfying activity after retirement. The economic significance of the education limitations of the veterans now 65 and over and of the increasing formal education background of the veterans who will be coming into this age group in the future cannot be adequately appraised pending the availability of further data. Summary (Chapter I) The foregoing review has covered the major aspects of the veteran 65 and over age group from the standpoint of their economic maintenance by themselves or as assisted where necessary by Government agencies to meet situations, standards, and criteria considered in Chapter III following hereon. It is apparent that the group is growing rapidly and under dynamic personal conditions that call for continuing review and the maintenance of alert and progressive adjustment by the legislative and the executive agencies directly concerned, such as the Veterans Administration. Chapter II ECONOMIC BACKGROUND DEVELOPMENTS PRODUCTIVITY OF THE ECONOMIC SYSTEM INFLATION AND THE PURCHASING POWER OF THE Monetary inflation in the United States Uneven impact of inflation Impact of inflation on veterans' compensation rates Conclusion THE ECONOMIC NEED QUALIFICATION The need concept in public assistance State variations in the monetary valuation of need The following review covers several basic economic concepts and background developments of increasing importance to public judgment and to decisions on policy, program determination and administration with reference to the economic position of the aging veteran. The most important of these are the advancing productivity in the American economic system, purchasing power fluctuations arising from inflation, and economic aspects of the need concept underlying the determination of eligibility for participation by veterans aged 65 and over in public and private programs to maintain or raise individual living standards. PRODUCTIVITY OF THE ECONOMIC SYSTEM The benefits from increasing productivity of the economic system of a free country, which results in a greater output of better goods and services, can be shared in a great many ways. Greater volume, higher quality and increasing usefulness of the old or introduction of new products or services, lower prices or more for the same price to consumers, increased profits of which part may be returned as investment to increase productivity further, shorter hours or workweek and less onerous work, increased wage rates and other benefits -- all may reflect economic productivity advances. The sharing of the benefits of such advances among the above alternatives has been increasingly subject to private and public controls and agreements. While the veteran aged 65 and over may benefit in so far as products and prices reflect such progress, the types of income on which he mainly depends other than from employment do not adjust to give him a full share unless they are administratively changed in response to legislative policy authorization and appropriation. According to the best available data, the economic productivity of the United States on a per capita basis, as measured by the gross national product adjusted for price level changes, has been increasing on the average one to two percent a year. Progress has come, however, by fits and starts with variations in the rate of introduction of new techniques and equipment, sometimes impeded by contractual agreements which can be changed only after lengthy negotiation, and influenced by semi-cyclical fluctuations in the rate of capital accumulation and the expenditures on efficiencyimproving plants, equipment and methods. Some early attempts to provide contractually for "automatic" participation in the benefits by agreement of the groups directly involved in production have been hampered by the difficulties of determining the degree and origin of such advancements in individual industries, companies and operations. Although at the overall national economic level of primary concern here such difficulties are minimized, more work needs to be done and more experience accumulated before a reasonable formula basis for adjustment of such payments can be developed as a guide to the bargaining or legislative process concerned. Currently differing social, political and economic philosophies and interests throw different professional, economic and statistical light on the same set of estimates. Participation in benefits by aging veterans Nevertheless, if the veteran aged 65 and over is to share fully along with others in the benefits of the advancing productivity of the American economy, some periodic adjustment of the relatively fixed payments making up the bulk of his income is called for on a more deliberate basis. The greater the precision with which payments are aligned with need or other criteria, the more important an adjustment of this type becomes, as it acquires an increasingly marginal significance. Under these circumstances, an affirmative policy with respect to assuring full participation by the aging veteran would call for more deliberate specific investigation and review on a periodic basis of perhaps every three or five years. INFLATION AND THE PURCHASING POWER OF THE AGING VETERAN'S INCOME DOLLAR Monetary and credit inflation problems are of ancient lineage. They have in times past given rise to intricate regulatory controls and adjustments. They have ranged in origin from deliberate and accidental abuses or errors such as the early arts of clipping and debasing coinage, and their modern counterpart called revaluation when done on a formal basis, to issuing currency or public and |