Women are living longer-policies can help them live better

Women are living longer, but not necessarily better. Women in low-income countries will live seven years more than their mothers did. Those in middle-income countries will have three more years of life. These additional years will not necessarily be good ones. A lifetime of disadvantages in access to quality health services, income, jobs, and care, all limit women’s ability to thrive and continue contributing as they age. Policies and programs that help aging women in low- and middle-income countries remain healthy and independent will benefit everyone.

Our recent paper, Prosperous, Healthy, and Dignified: Policy Pathways for Older Women in Developing Countries, takes on this topic and questions two common assumptions: first, that older men and women face the same challenges; and second, that aging policy starts in old age.

Most older adults are women

Women comprise 54 percent of global population aged 60 and above, and 62 percent of the global population above 80.  There are 400 million women aged 60 or above in developing countries today, a figure projected to reach 900 million by 2050. 

Aging looks different for women

Women in low- and middle-income countries are aging with more income insecurity, poorer health, and greater unmet care needs than men.

Income insecurity. Older working women are more informally employed, earn less, and have less access to pensions: 41 percent of retired women receive a pension in lower-middle income countries, compared to 55 percent of men. And when they do receive a pension, it is often a significantly lower value than men’s due to fewer years of work and lower salaries.

Poor health. A World Health Organization (WHO) survey found that women perceive the same level of health as men a decade older. Older women tend to suffer from high rates of chronic conditions such as arthritis and osteoporosis, as well as cognitive and psychological conditions, particularly dementia and depression.

Unmet care needs. Older women face higher levels of social isolation than men. One in four women over age 65 lives alone, more than twice the share of men. Older women living alone struggle to take care of their own basic daily tasks such as eating, managing medication, shopping, or getting needed health care services. Long-term care needs intensify among the “older old” at age 80 and above, where women are overrepresented.

Aging policy should not start in old age

The main vulnerabilities older women face do not arise suddenly. Their old-age income insecurity is a result of a lifetime of gender wage gaps, limited asset accumulation, and ineligibility for old-age pension, after a lifetime dedicated to homecare or informal employment. Their poor health in old age partly emerges from early health care gaps, including parental preference for health spending for sons over daughters, gender gaps in the supply of health services and health risks from child-bearing years.

Aging policies that solely focus on old‑age, and gender policies that solely focus on women’s working and reproductive years, both fall short.  A “life-course” approach can address gender-inequalities before they compound with age, while tackling the unique challenges that accompany women into old age.

Policies can help women age with prosperity, health, and dignity

Prosperous aging policies provide income security for those who are already old, while closing gender disparities in labor and financial markets, and social insurance programs for younger women. The World Bank’s Cash Transfer Modernization Project in Bangladesh supports unconditional cash transfers to vulnerable groups, including women who have lost income security through widowhood, desertion, or destitution. In Latin America, the International Finance Corporation’s Silver Economy work supports financial products focused on older women, such as flexible savings accounts, tailored insurance plans, and targeted financial advisory and education programs, that can empower women to achieve greater financial security and prosperity.  Such support strengthens household resilience and creates jobs while reducing long-term pressure on public transfers.

Healthy aging is only possible if health systems meaningfully extend beyond maternal and reproductive years, even as they support today’s young women to live healthier. The World Bank’s Protecting Vulnerable People Against Noncommunicable Diseases (NCDs) Project in Argentina worked on both preventing NCDs and preparing health facilities to deliver high quality care, including cervical and breast cancer screenings for poor women. The Kerala Health Systems Improvement Program in India aims to improve the life expectancy and quality of life for 11 million older people, through wider access to health coverage and resilient health systems. Such initiatives can ensure that women are healthy when they go into old age and they maintain their health in the later years, reducing the burden on finances and health systems.

Dignified aging needs care systems that allow people to live independently later in life. In Viet Nam, intergenerational self‑help clubs provide community‑based care and social support for older people, particularly in rural areas. These models improve health outcomes and reduce isolation for the elderly. In North Macedonia, the World Bank supported the expansion of home‑based care services which allowed more than 1,600 older people to live more independently while creating paid care jobs—many taken up by younger women from disadvantaged and minority communities. This illustrates how aging policy, when designed with a gender lens, can reduce inequality while expanding employment.

Ensuring older women's welfare is an investment, not an expense

Ignoring the needs and contributions of older women is costly. Expert speakers and panelists argued that we need to bring a gender lens to aging policy and an aging lens to gender policy during the “Healthy, Dignified, and Prosperous: Older Women Thriving through Better Laws, Policies and Practices,” event at the 2026 UN Commission on the Status of Women. The most effective strategies invest early and continuously—in girls’ education, women’s health, fair labor markets, and asset accumulation—so that longer lives are productive rather than precarious.

Aging is often framed as a burden. The evidence suggests otherwise. With the right policies, older women can live dignified, healthy and prosperous long lives while continuing to contribute to households, communities, and countries.

 “Prosperous, Healthy, and Dignified: Policy Pathways for Older Women in Developing Countries” is a key report of the World Bank’s Human Capital Project.