Successful Ageing and Poverty: The Case of Peru

Javier Olivera, University of Luxembourg
Isabelle Tournier, University of Luxembourg

We study the determinants of Successful Ageing (SA) in a sample of 4,151 old Peruvians living in poverty. The data correspond to the ESBAM survey, which is the baseline to evaluate the non-contributory public pension program Pension 65. A key contribution is to combine the conceptual appealing of SA to measure well-being in old-age with the multidimensional poverty counting approach developed in the economic literature. This setting takes advantage of the full distribution of success along the set of dimensions of well-being. Nine indicators of SA have been used to assess the dimensions of physical health, functioning, cognition, emotional health, and life satisfaction. From a policy perspective, the results of this study report a notably stable effect of three variables affecting SA that can be relatively easy to measure, monitor and affect by public intervention. These variables are food security, nutrition quality, and self-esteem.