I revisit trends in the level and distribution of income among Canadian seniors in the context of what is arguably the major source of change in these trends since the end of the seventies: the maturation of Canada's public and private earnings-related pension systems. The expanded role of earnings related pensions in the 1980s and 1990s is largely the result of changes that occurred in the 1950s and 1960s. The Canada and Quebec Pension Plans (C/QPP) were implemented in 1966 and the first cohort to receive full C/QPP benefits turned 65 in 1976. Cohorts retiring after this period were also the beneficiaries of the expansion of private occupational pensions that took place between the 1950s and the 1970s. I rely on a detailed decomposition of income by source to show that the maturation of these earnings-related programs produced not only a substantial increase in average real incomes but also a substantial reduction in income inequality among older persons, due mainly to higher C/QPP benefits. Rising real incomes went disproportionately to lower income seniors contributing to the well-known decline in low-income rates among older persons.

This study examines the relationship between ethnicity and the provision of assistance to older relatives. A sample of employed Canadians (N = 2,753), a subsample of the CARNET Work and Family Survey, is used to explore how ethnicity influences the amount of assistance provided to older relatives. Findings from our study suggest that Asians, East Indians, and Southern Europeans provide higher levels ofhelp than British respondents. Final obligation affects the amount of help provided but plays a similar role within each ethnic group. However, structural factors — in particular, living arrangement and age — are stronger predictors of the level of involvement in helping older relatives than are cultural factors of filial obligation and belonging to a particular ethnic group.

A study ofolder adults in Israel (n = 170) examined the relationship of activity level and social network characteristics to respondents' subjective well-being, controlling for background socio-demographic characteristics and extent of physical disability. Factor analysis derived three activity factors corresponding to formal, informal and solitary activity. A hierarchical regression procedure revealed that physical disability accounted for 40 per cent of the variance in the well-being measure. Extent of informal activity explained another 3 percent of the variance, but was outweighed in the final model by the addition of a social network factor – degree of network supportiveness (R2 =.48). The findings suggest that it is the social network aspect of activity that makes a difference in older persons' subjective well-being, rather than the effect of activity per se.

Data from the Quebec Health Survey (QHS) were used to examine the influence of physical health status on responses to the somatic and affective-cognitive components ofthe QHS psychological distress inventory (PDI) in three age groups (n = 600): 18–39 years, 40–64 years and 65 years and over. A structural equation modelling strategy using LISKEL VIII was employed to test an explanatory model of the association between physical health and both components of the PDI. The model included sex, perceived life stress, social support, and marital status as covariates. Results showed that the affective-cognitive component of distress was the main explanatory factor in the somatic symptom index. Results also indicated that physical health directly affects responses to the somatic component of the PDI. However, the same effect of physical health on responses to somatic symptoms was found in all three age groups. Findings lead to the conclusion that using a psychological distress measure that includes somatic items, like the PDI, will result in a small overestimation of psychological distress in older adults and younger age groups as well. However, somatic items do not introduce a differential bias in the estimation of respondents' psychological distress status according to age.

This article examines to what extent the presence or absence, adequacy or inadequacy of formal services impacts on the work trajectory of caregivers to elderly relatives. The article is based on a qualitative study with 20 employed caregivers' whose elderly relatives received homecare services from one of two Montreal CLSCs: Results reveal the key role played by formal services in caregivers' attempts to juggle caregiving demands with those of their employment. They illustrate how the presence or the insufficiency of these services, their adequacy or inadequacy, combined with the other accommodations which caregivers put into place, can be determinants in caregivers' decisions to continue working and in their capacity to function well in the work place.

This research investigated the prevalence of depression among the elderly Chinese in Canada. The respondents totalled 96 randomly selected elderly Chinese living in Calgary. A 15-item Chinese version of the Geriatric Depression Scale was used as the depression measure. Results show that among the respondents, 9.4 per cent were mildly depressed and 11.5 per cent were moderately to severely depressed. The overall prevalence rate of depression in the elderly Chinese is higher than that of the general elderly population in Canada, but lower than that of the elderly Chinese in the United States. Findings from regression analysis show that having more illnesses, having lived in Canada longer, not knowing English, being younger in age, and having poor physical health are the significant predictors of depression in the elderly Chinese. The results indicate the mental health needs of this group of ethnic elderly. Other research and practice implications of the findings are also discussed in the paper.