The proportion and number of older workers (those over the age of 65) is expected to increase significantly in the coming decades, and examining this cohort's travel behavior may provide insight into this potential future boom. This paper is an exploratory analysis to describe the working patterns of the older population today, to examine their work trips, and to make some guesses about how the baby boomer generation and will be similar or differ from today's older population. Using available literature on elderly travel, and data from the 2000 U.S. decennial Census and the 2001 National Household Travel Survey (NHTS), this paper explores commute and occupational characteristics of older workers in the work force. Topics covered in the paper include projected increase in miles driven by older population groups, trends in labor force participation, occupations of older workers, overall travel patterns, travel time, and mode-to-work characteristics; examination of race and ethnic origin of older workers, and description of older worked-at-home population.
Abstract