Precarity in Late Life: Understanding new forms of risk and vulnerability

Abstract

Background: Population aging and longevity in the context of declining social commitments, raises concerns about disadvantage and widening inequality in late life. Objective: This paper explores the usefulness of the concept of precarity for understanding new and sustained forms of risk and vulnerability in late life. Method/Approach: The article reviews the aging and late life Analysis: We argue that a broadened lens of precarity that is inclusive of aging, time, and care, can be used to situate risk in the economic and political context. Further, that doing so, challenges individual notions of risk, and demonstrates how vulnerabilities not only accumulate, but change at the moment of needing care, in the context of austerity. Discussion/Implications: The concept of precarity thus holds potential to draw attention to disadvantage carried into late life, and render visible new forms of vulnerability that affect late life.