The boomers' impending retirement has spurred interest in tapping their productive energies to benefit society. This study examines older adults' decisions to stop or start formal volunteer work. The findings show that older adults usually stick with their original decisions, but more often stop than start volunteering. Volunteers who contribute a lot of hours over many years and who are married to volunteers are less likely to quit. And nonvolunteers are more likely to start volunteering if they have been uninvolved for few years and their spouses volunteer. The results highlight the importance of volunteer retention strategies for nonprofit agencies.

This study looks at older adults retiring between 1996 and 2004 to see who engages in formal volunteering after retirement. The results, based on data from the Health and Retirement Survey, show that while most volunteers acquire the volunteer habit while still working, a significant share begins volunteer work after retirement. Among adults who retire, 45 percent engage in formal volunteer activities even though only 34 percent of these same adults volunteered while working. Since boomer cohorts following this group will be much larger, nonprofit organizations seem destined to benefit from a significant growth in the services of retirees.

Staying engaged in work and formal volunteer activities at older ages significantly benefits the well-being of the volunteers, the organizations that count on them, the people served by those organizations, and the economy. This study, based on data from the Health and Retirement Survey, shows that over 10 million healthy older adults with no caregiving responsibilities did not work or volunteer in 2004. About half of these able seniors are under age 75 and 9 out of 10 have prior work experience. Given this untapped potential, shortages of volunteers and workers should prompt employers and nonprofits to court this talent.

Increasingly, studies are documenting that engaged older people remain in better health. Volunteering allows older adults to stay active as they reduce the time they devote to paid work. Today, older adults who assign high importance to religion, and those with higher incomes and more education volunteer more often than others, while Hispanics volunteer less often. Policymakers should gauge the value and potential growing demand for more volunteer opportunities as society ages. Initiatives that target older adults with low rates of volunteering could yield some big payoffs.

The job characteristics and attitudes of adult workers age 65 and older reveal a group enjoying work and not anxious to leave the labor market. The fact that many of these workers are self-employed and working part time at jobs with relatively limited physical demands may help to explain their satisfaction with work. Older workers in all wealth groups share these positive attitudes about work. The results suggest work situations pleasing to older adults that could be emulated by other employers and encouraged by public policies with the ultimate goal of increasing health and financial well being of older Americans.