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Purpose: This study was designed to improve the measurement of financial exploitation (FE) by testing psychometric properties of the older adult financial exploitation measure (OAFEM), a client self-report instrument. Design and Methods: Rasch item response theory and traditional validation approaches were used. Questionnaires were administered by 22 adult protective services investigators from 7 agencies in Illinois to 227 substantiated abuse clients. Analyses included tests for dimensionality, model fit, and additional construct validation. Results from the OAFEM were also compared with the substantiation decision of abuse and with investigators' assessments of FE using a staff report version. Hypotheses were generated to test hypothesized relationships. Results: The OAFEM, including the original 79-, 54-, and 30-item measures, met stringent Rasch analysis fit and unidimensionality criteria and had high internal consistency and item reliability. The validation results were supportive, while leading to reconsideration of aspects of the hypothesized theoretical hierarchy. Thresholds were suggested to demonstrate levels of severity. Implications: The measure is now available to aid in the assessment of FE of older adults by both clinicians and researchers. Theoretical refinements developed using the empirically generated item hierarchy may help to improve assessment and intervention. Key Words: Financial abuse, Mistreatment, Rasch measurement, Exploitation theory, Theoretical hierarchy doi: 10.1093/geront/gnq054

Financial abuse is a growing problem for older adults. This article outlines four major strategies for addressing elder financial abuse.. (a) education and outreach, (b) general detection and universal screening, (c) legal interventions, and (d) multidisciplinary teams. Future efforts should be devoted to understanding the efficiency and effectiveness of these various strategies in order to keep older adults from becoming victims of financial abuse and to intervene as soon as possible once financial abuse has been identified. KEYWORDS elder abuse, financial abuse, Financial Abuse Specialist Teams (FASTs), legal interventions, Multidisciplinary Teams (MDTs), screening DOI: 10.1080/08946566.2010.490182

Inter-vivos financial transfers from older parents to their adult children are widespread in the United States. Childless people may simply make fewer transfers. On the other hand, because their giving is away from children, their decisions are more complex in that there are multiple potential targets of approximately equal attractiveness. Using data for 1996 to 2004 from the United States Health and Retirement Study, this article examines the differences between parents and childless older people in financial transfers to people other than their children. The results show that, overall, parents tend to give less than the childless to other people. However, some variation is found depending on the nature and target of the gift. Having children does not affect giving to charities but does reduce the prevalence of giving to parents, but not nearly as much as the reduction in giving to family and friends. It can therefore be concluded, first that there is little substitution between personal and impersonal transfers; secondly, that the sense of obligation to parents is not reduced by giving to charities or to children; and thirdly, that having children reduces the need to satisfy the desire for family and social ties by means of links to family and friends. KEY WORDS--inter-vivos transfers, bequests, life-cycle, altruism. Ageing & Society 29, 2009, 1207-1225. [C] 2009 Cambridge University Press Doi: 1017/S0144686X08008362 Printed in the United Kingdom

In recent years, increasing public attention has been paid to voluntary action, civic engagement and philanthropy. It is in this framework that the growing numbers of childless older people are regarded as a valuable source of charitable giving. In fact, by giving to philanthropic foundations instead of consuming their wealth or leaving inheritances childless donors may develop into pioneers in the field of post-familial civic engagement. The article explores the circumstances under which childless older people adopt this behaviour in both Germany and the United States of America. It is found that making large donations or setting up philanthropic foundations is still an elite phenomenon, but on the other hand that establishing a foundation is attractive for childless people, both as a means of ensuring that one's name lives on, and as a way of organising bequests. Educational level, ill-health, social capital and religiosity all positively reinforce the inclination of childless people to transfer resources to charities. It is also shown that the institutional framework or organised fundraising has a large role in fostering charitable giving among the childless. The framework of charity organisations and fund raising in the country of residence plays an important role in determining the expansion and democratisation of charitable giving. KEY WORDS--philanthropy, charitable giving, childlessness, interactionism, Germany, USA. Ageing & Society 29, 2009, 1185-1205. [C] 2009 Cambridge University Press doi: 10.1017/S0144686X08008295 Printed in the United Kingdom

The authors examined relationships between the wealth of older adults and their early-life decisions regarding investment in human capital, family formation, and work activities in Mexico, using the 2001 Mexican Health and Aging Study. The authors examined correlates of accumulated financial wealth by gender and across three age cohorts: 50 to 59, 60 to 69, and 70 years or older. The authors outline the changing context these cohorts experienced during their lifetimes; describe patterns of net financial worth by main covariates across groups defined by age, sex, and marital status; and present the results of multivariate models of net worth. Simulations were conducted to illustrate patterns of net worth associated with alternative scenarios depicting differing representative combinations of life-course characteristics by age cohort. The findings suggest that old-age financial wealth in Mexico is more closely associated with family formation and human capital decisions than with employment decisions over the lifetime. Keywords: Mexico; wealth; elderly; life course; employment

Purpose: To validate a survey research measure of subjective income, as measured by perceived income adequacy, in an international context. Design and Methods: The study population comprised persons aged 50 years and older in 12 countries from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (n = 28,939). Perceived difficulty in making ends meet was regressed on sociodemographic variables, economic indicators, health status measures, and expectations regarding one's financial future. Country differences were also controlled. Results: The findings confirm a multidimensional explanation of perceived income adequacy but also point to the primacy of objective economic indicators in predicting household financial distress. Respondents aged 80 years and older report less financial difficulty. Poor health status and pessimistic financial expectations also predict greater household financial distress but to a lesser degree. Implications: Self-rated economic status is a robust indicator of financial capacity in older age and can be used by practitioners to gain meaningful information. However, practitioners should keep in mind that the oldest-old may underestimate financial difficulties. Key Words: Self-rated economic status, Persons aged 50+, Household finances, Making ends meet, SHARE

This article provides detailed estimates of earnings losses of older workers (aged 40 years and older) who experience mass layoffs relative to a continuously employed comparison group. The analysis made use of information from the unemployment insurance system for the state of Connecticut. These administrative records contain payroll information for virtually all workers in the state and, relative to previous research on the basis of survey data, contain many more instances of workers displaced because of mass layoffs. These data provided the basis for detailed, disaggregated estimates by age, gender, and industry of employment. The estimates indicated that earnings losses associated with displacement rose sharply with age and were larger for those subsequently reemployed in different industry sectors. These findings are consistent with the idea that earnings decline following displacement due to losses of firm-specific human capital. Earnings reductions were larger for men than women but were proportionately very similar. Keywords: job displacement; older workers; earnings losses; administrative data

In this study we examine the association between household food insecurity and seasonally high heating and cooling costs. Logistic regression models, controlling for socioeconomic and demographic characteristics, were estimated using data on household food security and economic and demographic data from the 1995-2001 Current Population Survey Food Security Supplements and state-level data on heating and cooling degree days from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Low-income households, especially those consisting entirely of elderly persons, experienced substantial seasonal differences in the incidence of very low food security (the more severe range of food insecurity) in areas with high winter heating costs and high summer cooling costs. In high-cooling states, the odds of very low food security for poor, elderly only households were 27% higher in the summer than in the winter. In high-heating states, the pattern was reversed for such households; the odds of very low food security were 43% lower in the summer. In light of recent sharp increases in home heating and cooling costs in many parts of the U.S., it is important to understand the extent to which households make tradeoffs between heating and cooling costs and other basic needs that affect their food security.

The usefulness of Medicaid for the elderly citizens of New York city, instead of Medicare, is described.

This study explores trends and patterns in states' policy decisions affecting the economic well-being of later-life individuals and families in the United States in recent decades, focusing on the 1990s. Rules were selected from the areas of inheritance, estate taxes, homestead exemptions, Medicaid eligibility, estate recovery, and filial responsibility. Results indicate an increasing use of a broad definition of family, one implying that spouses, the nuclear family, extended kin, step-relations, and sometimes in-laws constitute an ongoing collective whose members share economic resources and risks over their lives and beyond. Despite this global trend, states varied in their rules addressing intrafamilial financial obligations and families' accountability to states. While some seemed interested in facilitating the conservation of familial resources, others seemed willing to minimize public assistance while coercing kin into accepting financial responsibility for one another. Research was suggested to answer questions raised by this study, doi:10.1300/J031v18n03_14[Article copies available for a fee from 777e Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address: Website: [c]2006 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.] KEYWORDS. Aging, elderly, family, policy, law. inheritance, Medicaid, estate recovery, filial responsibility