The research team, led by Jingjie Zhu, Bo Ye, and colleagues at Fudan University, combined data from six large health and retirement cohort studies, including 79,833 men and 95,485 women aged 50 and older. Rather than relying on a single national dataset, the investigators pooled longitudinal information across 28 countries, allowing them to compare how personal circumstances and national conditions jointly shape working lives. To estimate healthy working life expectancy, they used discrete-time Markov multi-state models, a statistical framework that tracks how individuals move between three states over time: healthy and working, unhealthy or not working, and death. This approach captures not just whether people are employed, but whether that employment is sustained by good health, making it a far more meaningful metric for retirement policy than simple life expectancy.

The headline numbers are sobering. At age 50, participants could expect to live a total of 33.59 years on average, but only 10.98 of those years were expected to be spent in good health while working. In other words, fewer than one in three of the years remaining to a typical 50-year-old are likely to be healthy working years. The gender gap was pronounced: men could expect 12.36 healthy working years, while women could expect just 9.82, a difference of more than two and a half years. That disparity reflects a tangle of factors, including differences in employment patterns, caregiving burdens, chronic disease profiles, and the types of jobs women disproportionately hold, all of which compound over the second half of life.

At the individual level, the study identified a familiar but powerful set of predictors. Marriage, higher educational attainment, and healthy lifestyle behaviors were all associated with longer healthy working life expectancy, while chronic diseases consistently shortened it. The magnitude of some of these effects is remarkable. Stroke emerged as the single most damaging condition, cutting healthy working life expectancy by 5.49 years on average, nearly half of the total healthy working years a typical 50-year-old can expect. The findings underscore that the diseases and behaviors tracked by public health agencies for decades are not merely matters of personal wellbeing; they directly determine how long people can remain economically active, with consequences for household income, pension systems, and national labor supply.

What sets this study apart, however, is its systematic examination of country-level factors. The researchers assembled a battery of national indicators from the World Bank spanning three domains: economic conditions, employment conditions, and governance quality. The economic measures included gross domestic product per capita, health expenditure, tax revenue, and the Gini index of income inequality. Employment measures captured flexible working arrangements, labor force participation, equal workforce opportunities, and hiring and firing practices. Governance measures assessed government effectiveness, control of corruption, and political stability. By linking these national metrics to individual-level cohort data, the team could ask whether the societies people live in shape their healthy working years independently of their personal characteristics.

The answer, in short, is yes. Higher health expenditure, greater GDP per capita, and higher tax revenue were all associated with longer healthy working life expectancy, consistent with the idea that better-funded health systems and stronger social safety nets keep older workers healthy and attached to the labor force. Governance mattered as well: countries with more effective governments, better control of corruption, and greater ease of doing business showed longer healthy working lives, while higher income inequality, as measured by the Gini index, and political instability were associated with shorter ones. These associations suggest that the institutional environment, not just individual fortune, plays a substantial role in determining who gets to age productively and who is forced out of work by illness or circumstance.

The employment-related findings carry particularly direct policy implications. Higher levels of flexible working arrangements, greater labor force participation, stronger equal workforce opportunities, and more favorable hiring and firing practices were consistently associated with longer healthy working life expectancy and longer healthy non-working life expectancy, alongside shorter unhealthy non-working life expectancy. In practical terms, this means that in countries where older workers can negotiate flexible schedules, where age discrimination is limited, and where labor markets are neither so rigid that older workers cannot be hired nor so precarious that illness leads to immediate exclusion, people spend more of their later years in a healthy state, whether working or not. The pattern suggests that labor market design is not merely an economic lever but a public health one.

The study’s authors are careful to note its limitations. Follow-up periods differed across the six cohorts, some countries contributed relatively small samples, and the 28 countries included do not cover the entire globe, particularly underrepresenting low-income regions. These constraints may limit cross-country comparability and the generalizability of the estimates. Multi-state models also depend on the accuracy of self-reported health and employment data, which may be measured differently across cultures. Even so, the consistency of the associations across such a large and diverse sample lends considerable weight to the central conclusion: extending healthy working lives requires action at both levels, the individual and the national, and neither alone will suffice.

The timing of these findings could hardly be more consequential. Across Europe, East Asia, and North America, policymakers are legislating later retirement ages to shore up pension systems strained by rising longevity and shrinking workforces. France’s contested pension reforms, China’s gradual retirement age increases, and similar debates elsewhere all rest on an implicit assumption that people can work longer. This study quantifies how much healthy working capacity actually exists, and the answer, roughly 11 years after age 50 in the pooled sample, suggests that simply raising the retirement age without improving health and working conditions risks pushing many older adults into years of unhealthy employment or involuntary exclusion from the labor force.

The authors argue that interventions targeting modifiable individual risk factors should be pursued across the life course, from preventing stroke and other chronic diseases to promoting education and healthy lifestyles, while national measures should be tailored to each country’s social, economic, and employment context. There is no single prescription: a country with high income inequality may need different policies than one with weak labor protections or underfunded health care. But the study’s central message is clear and, in an era of demographic anxiety, quietly optimistic. Healthy working life expectancy is not a fixed biological destiny. It responds to the choices individuals make about their health and the choices societies make about how they organize work, distribute resources, and govern themselves. As the world ages, those choices will increasingly determine not just how long people live, but how long they live well and productively.

Subject of Research: Country- and individual-level determinants of healthy working life expectancy among adults aged 50 and older across 28 countries

Article Title: Country- and individual-level factors associated with healthy working life expectancy: A multinational longitudinal study

Article References: Zhu, J., Ye, B., Huang, Z., You, H., Jiang, J., Yang, S., & Gao, J. (2026). Country- and individual-level factors associated with healthy working life expectancy: A multinational longitudinal study. PLOS Medicine, 23(9), e1004676. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1004676

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pmed.1004676

Keywords: healthy working life expectancy, population aging, retirement age, PLOS Medicine, longitudinal cohort study, chronic disease, stroke, labor force participation, income inequality, governance, flexible working arrangements, multi-state models

The headline figure comes from the employment-to-population ratio, one of the most widely watched indicators in labor economics because it captures the share of an entire population that is actually working, rather than merely the share of active job seekers who hold jobs. For people with disabilities aged 16 to 64, the ratio rose from 39.8 percent in August 2026 to 40.3 percent in September 2026, an increase of 0.5 percentage points, or 1.3 percent in relative terms. For people without disabilities in the same age range, the ratio edged up from 74.6 percent to 75.0 percent, a gain of 0.4 percentage points. Because the ratio divides the number of people working by the total population and multiplies by 100, it is sensitive to both hiring trends and demographic shifts, making its sustained rise for workers with disabilities a meaningful signal of genuine labor market inclusion rather than a statistical artifact.

John O’Neill, PhD, director of the Center for Employment and Disability Research at Kessler Foundation, framed the September numbers as a turning point after a long period of stagnation. He noted that the employment-to-population ratio for people with disabilities reached an all-time high of 40.3 percent, breaking through what researchers had described as the post-COVID employment plateau. O’Neill also pointed to a possible economic driver behind the breakthrough, observing that last month’s numbers may have crossed the 40 percent barrier because rising prices are compelling people with disabilities to work in order to help support their families. That interpretation underscores a recurring theme in disability employment research: labor force outcomes for this population are shaped not only by demand-side factors such as employer hiring practices and workplace accommodations, but also by cost-of-living pressures that can pull additional workers into the labor market.

The labor force participation rate, a companion indicator that measures the percentage of the population either working, actively seeking work within the past four weeks, or on temporary layoff or furlough, also moved higher in September. For people with disabilities aged 16 to 64, participation increased from 43.4 percent in August to 43.8 percent in September, a rise of 0.4 percentage points that represents a 0.9 percent relative gain. Among people without disabilities, the participation rate inched up from 77.9 percent to 78.1 percent, a 0.2 percentage point increase. The parallel movement in both indicators matters because rising participation alongside rising employment suggests that more people with disabilities are not only finding jobs but are also entering the labor market with reasonable prospects of being hired, rather than becoming discouraged and dropping out of the count altogether.

Andrew Houtenville, PhD, professor of economics and director of the UNH Institute on Disability, described the past two months of labor market figures for people with disabilities as remarkable, emphasizing that labor force participation for this group also reached a record level of 43.8 percent in September. His assessment highlights how unusual the current stretch has been: in many prior economic cycles, workers with disabilities tended to experience disproportionate losses during slowdowns, as employers cut flexible or part-time arrangements and hiring pipelines narrowed. The fact that both employment and participation set records in a month when national job growth slowed to 29,000 positions suggests that the structural gains of recent years, including expanded remote work options, stronger employer disability inclusion initiatives, and tighter labor markets that encouraged firms to tap previously underutilized talent pools, may be proving more durable than earlier cyclical improvements.

The year-over-year comparison reinforces that durability. Compared with September 2025, the employment-to-population ratio for people with disabilities rose from 38.2 percent to 40.3 percent, an increase of 2.1 percentage points, while labor force participation climbed from 42.1 percent to 43.8 percent, up 1.7 percentage points. Over the same period, people without disabilities saw far more modest movement, with their employment-to-population ratio rising from 74.7 percent to 75.0 percent, a gain of just 0.3 percentage points, and their participation rate increasing from 77.9 percent to 78.1 percent, up 0.2 percentage points. The widening gap between the two groups’ growth rates indicates that the recent improvements for workers with disabilities are outpacing the general trend, narrowing, however slowly, a long-standing disparity in labor market outcomes that has persisted for decades.

In terms of raw numbers, the September data show that among workers aged 16 to 64, the 6,918,000 workers with disabilities represented 4.6 percent of the total 151,785,000 workers in the United States. That share has been gradually rising as employment gains for people with disabilities outpace overall workforce growth, a shift with implications for employers, policymakers, and disability services providers alike. A larger and more visible population of workers with disabilities increases demand for accessible workplaces, reasonable accommodations, and inclusive human resources practices, while also expanding the consumer and tax base contributions of a group that has historically faced elevated rates of poverty and economic exclusion. Researchers caution, however, that a 40 percent employment ratio still leaves a substantial majority of working-age adults with disabilities outside the workforce, so the milestone should be read as progress along a continuum rather than a destination.

The nTIDE report draws on data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics but is customized by the UNH Institute on Disability to focus on working-age adults between 16 and 64, a refinement that excludes retirement-age workers and provides a sharper picture of prime labor market activity. The monthly series, funded by the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living and Rehabilitation Research and Kessler Foundation, has become a standard reference for tracking how economic changes affect workers with and without disabilities. Alongside each release, the nTIDE team hosts a Lunch and Learn webinar that gives the public a chance to question the researchers directly and hear from invited panelists on current disability-related research and events, an outreach model designed to translate dense federal statistics into actionable knowledge for advocates, employers, and state agencies.

The October 2, 2026 webinar featured guest presenter Charyl S. Yarbrough, PhD, of the New Jersey Department of Labor & Workforce Development, joining O’Neill, Houtenville, and Kimberly Knackstedt, executive director at the Association of University Centers on Disabilities. Recordings of the session and previous episodes are archived at ResearchonDisability.org/nTIDE, where users can review the month-to-month and year-to-year comparisons that underpin the headline findings. For economists studying disability employment, the September 2026 report offers a case study in how a slowing aggregate economy can coexist with record outcomes for a specific population, and for disability advocates, it provides fresh evidence that sustained policy attention and employer engagement can push long-stuck indicators past symbolic thresholds. Whether the 40 percent mark becomes a new floor or a brief peak will depend on the months ahead, but for now the data document a genuine and measurable expansion of economic opportunity for Americans with disabilities.

Subject of Research: Employment trends for people with disabilities in the U.S. labor market

Article Title: Employment for people with disabilities in September: Surpassing 40% for the first time

Article References: Employment for people with disabilities in September: Surpassing 40% for the first time. (n.d.). Original publication

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: Not provided

Keywords: disability employment, nTIDE, Kessler Foundation, labor force participation, employment-to-population ratio, Bureau of Labor Statistics, University of New Hampshire, labor market, unemployment rate, economic inclusion, workforce data, September 2026 jobs report

The timing could hardly be more consequential. Sub-Saharan Africa remains the world’s least gender-equal region, with an economic parity index estimated at just 68.5 percent and a gender inequality ratio exceeding 0.5. Burkina Faso sits squarely within this pattern. According to the World Economic Forum’s global gender gap data, the country achieves 90.3 percent parity in educational attainment and 97.8 percent in health and survival, but only 67.4 percent parity in participation in economic opportunities. The 2019 national census adds a sobering layer: the overall literacy rate stands at 31.9 percent, with men at 36 percent and women at just 27.9 percent, while women’s unemployment has averaged roughly 6 percent over the past five years according to World Bank figures.

To test whether the money flowing into and within the economy was changing this picture, the researchers assembled annual time-series data from the World Bank’s World Development Indicators and the International Country Risk Guide. They measured women’s economic participation through the ratio of female to male labor force participation, foreign direct investment as a share of GDP, and net national savings as an indicator of an economy’s self-financing capacity. Institutional quality was captured through a composite index built from six World Governance Indicators, spanning rule of law, voice and accountability, regulatory quality, political stability, control of corruption, and government effectiveness, with weights determined by principal component analysis to avoid the multicollinearity problems that plague these strongly correlated measures.

The econometric backbone of the study is an autoregressive distributed lag, or ARDL, model, a technique chosen for good reason. Unlike classical cointegration methods, ARDL can handle variables that are stationary at different orders of integration, a property confirmed here by Dickey-Fuller and Phillips-Perron unit root tests showing some series stationary in levels and others only in first differences. It also suits relatively small samples, and this one, spanning 35 annual observations, qualifies. The optimal lag structure, selected with the Akaike Information Criterion, produced a specification of ARDL(4, 3, 4, 2, 3), and the bounds test confirmed a long-run equilibrium relationship among the variables. The model fit was striking, with a coefficient of determination of 0.95, though the authors are careful to note the small sample when interpreting that figure.

The headline result is unambiguous. In the long run, foreign direct investment carries a positive coefficient of 0.482, but the effect on women’s economic participation is statistically insignificant. Net national savings, by contrast, delivers a coefficient of 2.716, positive and statistically significant, roughly five and a half times the size of the FDI effect. The explanation, the authors argue, lies in the structure of the Burkinabe economy. FDI flows have risen from less than 0.01 percent of GDP in the 1980s to a peak of 2.40 percent between 2011 and 2015 before easing to 1.32 percent, but they remain concentrated in the mining sector, an industry that is highly capital-intensive and generates few jobs for women. Weak linkages between foreign firms and the domestic productive base further dampen any spillover effects on female employment.

Domestic savings tell a different story precisely because of where they go. Women in Burkina Faso are overwhelmingly employed in agriculture and the informal sector, parts of the economy that attract little foreign capital but benefit directly from domestically financed development programs in education, vocational training, financial inclusion, women’s entrepreneurship, and small and medium-sized enterprises. Savings also represent a more stable and sovereign source of funding, insulating development finance from the volatility of global capital markets. The finding echoes earlier work by Bolarinwa and Obembe, who showed that domestic savings play a key role in financing productive investment across sub-Saharan Africa, and contrasts with Zandile and Phiri’s evidence of negligible direct FDI effects on growth in Burkina Faso.

The study’s most striking twist involves institutional quality, which the authors model not as a simple control but as a moderator interacting with both capital sources. Here the interactions between foreign direct investment and institutional quality, and between net national savings and institutional quality, are both positive and statistically significant in the long run. In plain terms, the same dollar of foreign investment or the same franc of domestic savings buys more economic opportunity for women when institutions are effective, transparent, and accountable. Graphical analyses of the interaction effects show the relationship clearly: at low institutional quality, additional FDI yields only modest gains, while at high institutional quality the positive correlation steepens dramatically. The pattern aligns with the institutional economics of North and of the 2024 Nobel laureates Acemoglu, Johnson, and Robinson, whose work argues that inclusive institutions determine whether resources are converted into broad-based prosperity.

The short-run dynamics add an important nuance. Net national savings and institutional quality show negative short-run effects but positive long-run ones, a divergence the researchers attribute to adjustment rather than contradiction. Higher savings temporarily reduce current consumption, and institutional reforms take time before their benefits materialize. Meanwhile, the negative and significant error correction term, estimated at roughly 0.503, indicates that about half of any short-run disequilibrium is corrected within a single period, implying a relatively rapid return to the long-run equilibrium path. Robustness checks using the fully modified ordinary least squares estimator and an alternative dependent variable, the index of women’s economic rights, broadly confirm the baseline conclusions.

The policy implications are concrete. The authors recommend directing foreign investment toward sectors with high potential for women’s employment, including agribusiness, agricultural value chains, local product processing, digital services, and light manufacturing. They call for domestic savings mobilization to be paired with expanded financial inclusion for women, through access to formal banking, affordable credit, digital financial services, and tailored savings products. Most fundamentally, they argue that institutional reform, from simplified administrative procedures to anti-corruption mechanisms and the digitization of public services, is the lever that amplifies everything else. In a country where government effectiveness has improved only marginally, from minus 0.85 to minus 0.83 on a scale running from minus 2.5 to plus 2.5, the message is that governance itself is a form of capital. The study does have limits, as its authors acknowledge: national aggregates mask regional and sectoral heterogeneity, and the analysis cannot capture structural breaks linked to Burkina Faso’s recent political upheavals. But its core finding stands as a challenge to both aid-dependent and investment-attraction strategies alike: empowering women financially may begin not with foreign money, but with what a nation manages to save, and with the institutions trusted to put those savings to work.

Subject of Research: The effects of foreign direct investment and net national savings on women's economic participation in Burkina Faso, moderated by institutional quality

Article Title: Do foreign direct investment and net national savings promote women’s access to economic opportunities in Burkina Faso? the moderating role of institutional quality

Article References: Ouedraogo, A. R., & Ouedraogo, S. S. (2026). Do foreign direct investment and net national savings promote women’s access to economic opportunities in Burkina Faso? the moderating role of institutional quality. Discover Global Society, 4(1), Article 257. https://doi.org/10.1007/s44282-026-00608-y

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1007/s44282-026-00608-y

Keywords: Burkina Faso, foreign direct investment, net national savings, institutional quality, gender economics, women's economic empowerment, ARDL model, governance indicators, development economics, sub-Saharan Africa, labor force participation, foreign