ABSTRACT
The Health and Retirement Study (HRS) is now a well-known resource for the study of ageing and uniquely so for the economics of ageing. It has been emulated by similar harmonized longitudinal studies around the world, creating a network of mutual support and multiple sources of innovation. The HRS familiar to researchers today has evolved greatly from its founding design, while holding to and building on its core principles of population representation, longitudinality, multidisciplinary content, and public data sharing. Since 1992, the Health and Retirement Study has received support from the National Institute on Ageing via a cooperative award to the University of Michigan with co-funding from the Social Security Administration. The size and growth of older populations in the United States and around the world represent both a great achievement and an unprecedented challenge. At the end of 1996, there were three waves of data on the original HRS cohort and two waves of data on the AHEAD cohort.
