MagnifyMoney 
The COVID-19 pandemic brought a significant shock to the U.S. economy in 2020. Unemployment rose to 14.7% in April of that year — a figure that doesn’t even include those who voluntarily exited the workforce. Many Americans lost their jobs, while others stopped working due to business shutdowns or fear of contracting the virus.
Two years later, under different economic and public health conditions, many people have returned to work. But while older people may choose to retire during economic downturns — which many did in 2020 — some of those older Americans are returning to work, as the unemployment rate has plummeted and job openings have risen far past pre-pandemic highs.
Even though the number of retired Americans 65 and older is nearly 3 percentage points higher than in 2020, the number of working older adults is more than 2 percentage points higher — reflecting the broader economic recovery and strong labor market conditions.
This MagnifyMoney study analyzes U.S. Census Bureau Household Pulse Survey data to examine the labor environment for older Americans, comparing data from April and May 2020 to April and May 2022.
There are many potential reasons why older adults may be unretiring, or otherwise starting new jobs. For example, there’s much more competition among businesses for workers, leading to sign-on bonuses, better benefits and more choices for job seekers. The labor market has recovered faster than expected over the past two years:
Wages have also risen accordingly, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics. Median weekly wages were $951 in the first quarter of 2020, compared with $1,030 in the first quarter of 2022. However, due to inflation hitting a 40-year high, the real value of those wages declined slightly.
Both dynamics — higher pay and higher inflation — could encourage people to get back to work. Likewise, the 2022 stock market downturn could have older adults concerned about the state of their retirement savings.
Of course, the pandemic itself helps explain why a higher rate of older adults is working now than two years ago. COVID-19 disproportionately affects older people — though vaccinations have proved effective in helping prevent infections and deaths, and a vast majority of older Americans are now vaccinated. As such, older adults returning to work may feel safer interacting with co-workers or the public.
More than any other age cohort, older Americans prefer to work for themselves. Fewer than 10% of workers younger than 40 are self-employed, compared to more than a quarter of workers 65 and older.
| Government | Private | Nonprofit | Self-employed | Family | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 2022 | 2020 | 2022 | 2020 | 2022 | 2020 | 2022 | 2020 | 2022 | |
| 18 to 24 | 14.1% | 8.6% | 65.6% | 71.6% | 8.5% | 5.1% | 7.3% | 9.5% | 4.6% | 5.2% |
| 25 to 39 | 15.1% | 13.9% | 65.2% | 64.5% | 10.3% | 10.7% | 6.7% | 8.2% | 2.6% | 2.8% |
| 40 to 54 | 15.8% | 16.1% | 59.6% | 61.3% | 10.3% | 9.3% | 11.3% | 11.5% | 2.9% | 1.8% |
| 55 to 64 | 16.4% | 16.0% | 58.1% | 56.6% | 10.5% | 10.1% | 12.2% | 15.3% | 2.8% | 2.0% |
| 65 and older | 15.2% | 10.1% | 47.4% | 48.8% | 9.8% | 11.2% | 24.2% | 25.6% | 3.3% | 4.3% |
Source: MagnifyMoney analysis of U.S. Census Bureau Household Pulse Survey data. Note: The 2020 survey was fielded from April 23 to May 5, 2020, while the 2022 survey was fielded from April 27 to May 9, 2022.
The percentage of older workers employed by private companies, nonprofits and family businesses — as well as those who are self-employed — ticked slightly upward over the past two years. In contrast, the percentage of Americans 65 and older employed by the government fell from 15.2% of workers in 2020 to 10.1% in 2022.
In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, employers tried to entice older workers to retire to trim their payroll costs — and government workers were no exception.
However, older Americans aren’t the only ones with fewer government jobs: 14.1% of workers 18 to 24 were employed by the government in 2020, compared with 8.6% in 2022. Even though the U.S. economy has a strong labor market, the number of government jobs hasn’t recovered to its pre-pandemic high, and both the youngest and oldest workers are most impacted.
At the state level, there are some significant differences in labor force participation rates among older adults. In 2020, 18.1% of New Jersey residents 65 or older were part of the workforce, a rate that rose to 37.0% in 2022 — the largest difference in the U.S. During the early stages of the pandemic, New Jersey was one of the states hardest-hit by the virus, with deaths spiking in April 2020. That created significant obstacles for working older adults at the time.
Here are the states that saw the biggest changes in older adults in the workforce between 2020 and 2022:
Elsewhere, however, older adults are exiting the workforce, meaning some states saw a decrease in the rate of workers 65 or older since the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. Those states with the biggest decreases in the share of older adults in the workforce compared to 2020 are:
| Rank | State | % of working older adults, 2020 | % of working older adults, 2022 | Percentage point change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | New Jersey | 18.1% | 37.0% | 18.9 |
| 2 | West Virginia | 8.0% | 25.2% | 17.2 |
| 3 | Pennsylvania | 14.0% | 28.6% | 14.6 |
| 4 | New Hampshire | 16.5% | 25.3% | 8.7 |
| 5 | Georgia | 18.9% | 27.0% | 8.1 |
| 6 | Tennessee | 17.3% | 25.3% | 8.0 |
| 7 | Rhode Island | 14.9% | 22.8% | 7.9 |
| 7 | District of Columbia | 19.9% | 27.8% | 7.9 |
| 9 | Vermont | 25.8% | 33.4% | 7.6 |
| 9 | Oregon | 16.7% | 24.3% | 7.6 |
| 11 | Nebraska | 20.2% | 27.4% | 7.2 |
| 11 | Indiana | 13.4% | 20.6% | 7.2 |
| 13 | Washington | 15.6% | 22.7% | 7.1 |
| 14 | Kentucky | 19.6% | 26.6% | 7.0 |
| 15 | Virginia | 19.1% | 26.0% | 6.9 |
| 16 | Michigan | 14.2% | 21.0% | 6.8 |
| 17 | Connecticut | 22.7% | 28.8% | 6.1 |
| 18 | Minnesota | 17.1% | 22.3% | 5.2 |
| 18 | Colorado | 19.0% | 24.1% | 5.2 |
| 20 | Iowa | 19.9% | 24.4% | 4.5 |
| 21 | South Dakota | 19.8% | 24.0% | 4.2 |
| 21 | Nevada | 18.9% | 23.1% | 4.2 |
| 23 | Hawaii | 22.4% | 25.9% | 3.5 |
| 24 | South Carolina | 13.9% | 17.4% | 3.4 |
| 25 | Idaho | 23.5% | 26.6% | 3.1 |
| 26 | Florida | 15.1% | 18.1% | 3.0 |
| 27 | Texas | 23.0% | 25.0% | 2.0 |
| 28 | Missouri | 18.3% | 20.2% | 1.9 |
| 29 | Maryland | 20.5% | 21.5% | 1.0 |
| 30 | Arkansas | 16.0% | 16.7% | 0.7 |
| 30 | Montana | 24.6% | 25.3% | 0.7 |
| 32 | Alabama | 21.9% | 22.3% | 0.4 |
| 33 | New Mexico | 22.9% | 23.0% | 0.1 |
| 34 | Kansas | 23.7% | 23.5% | -0.2 |
| 35 | Illinois | 25.9% | 25.5% | -0.4 |
| 36 | Mississippi | 23.2% | 22.5% | -0.7 |
| 37 | Arizona | 18.8% | 18.0% | -0.8 |
| 37 | Louisiana | 15.2% | 14.4% | -0.8 |
| 39 | New York | 16.4% | 15.5% | -1.0 |
| 40 | Utah | 24.2% | 23.1% | -1.1 |
| 41 | Ohio | 19.3% | 17.8% | -1.5 |
| 41 | Oklahoma | 20.1% | 18.6% | -1.5 |
| 43 | Wyoming | 26.2% | 24.6% | -1.6 |
| 44 | Massachusetts | 25.2% | 21.7% | -3.4 |
| 45 | Delaware | 20.2% | 16.3% | -3.9 |
| 46 | California | 28.3% | 24.0% | -4.2 |
| 47 | Maine | 22.4% | 18.1% | -4.3 |
| 48 | Alaska | 28.9% | 24.5% | -4.4 |
| 49 | North Carolina | 26.4% | 20.1% | -6.3 |
| 50 | Wisconsin | 21.6% | 13.3% | -8.3 |
| 51 | North Dakota | 36.0% | 25.0% | -11.0 |
Source: MagnifyMoney analysis of U.S. Census Bureau Household Pulse Survey data. Notes: The 2020 survey was fielded from April 23 to May 5, 2020, while the 2022 survey was fielded from April 27 to May 9, 2022. Calculated percentage point differences might not match the subtraction of values due to rounding.
Even though labor force participation has risen across the country among those 65 and older, the rate of retirees 18 and older declined in five states over the 2020-to-2022 period: Iowa, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, South Dakota and West Virginia. In each of these states, a higher rate of older workers reentered the workforce over the past two years.
(Note: The Household Pulse Survey data doesn’t provide retirement data at the age level, so retirement mentions are specific to all adults 18 and older — though it’s fair to assume that the largest subset of retirees would come among the oldest age cohorts.)
| Rank | State | % of retired adults, 2020 | % of retired adults, 2022 | Percentage point change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | West Virginia | 23.3% | 21.6% | -1.7 |
| 2 | South Dakota | 17.9% | 17.0% | -0.9 |
| 3 | Kentucky | 16.4% | 16.2% | -0.1 |
| 4 | Iowa | 19.5% | 19.4% | -0.1 |
| 5 | Pennsylvania | 17.4% | 17.3% | -0.1 |
| 6 | Oregon | 18.6% | 18.9% | 0.3 |
| 7 | Minnesota | 17.5% | 18.0% | 0.5 |
| 8 | Delaware | 20.5% | 21.1% | 0.6 |
| 9 | Utah | 11.8% | 12.6% | 0.7 |
| 10 | Ohio | 16.3% | 17.1% | 0.8 |
| 11 | Rhode Island | 16.0% | 17.0% | 1.1 |
| 12 | Tennessee | 16.1% | 17.3% | 1.2 |
| 13 | Florida | 19.5% | 20.8% | 1.3 |
| 14 | Washington | 16.4% | 17.7% | 1.4 |
| 15 | Georgia | 13.4% | 14.7% | 1.4 |
| 16 | Nebraska | 14.9% | 16.4% | 1.5 |
| 17 | New Jersey | 12.0% | 13.6% | 1.6 |
| 18 | Texas | 10.5% | 12.3% | 1.8 |
| 19 | New Hampshire | 16.8% | 18.7% | 1.9 |
| 20 | Idaho | 16.4% | 18.4% | 2.0 |
| 21 | Indiana | 15.3% | 17.3% | 2.0 |
| 22 | Missouri | 16.7% | 18.9% | 2.2 |
| 23 | Vermont | 15.0% | 17.3% | 2.3 |
| 24 | Massachusetts | 13.6% | 16.0% | 2.4 |
| 25 | Montana | 18.4% | 20.8% | 2.4 |
| 26 | Oklahoma | 14.9% | 17.4% | 2.4 |
| 27 | California | 12.3% | 14.8% | 2.5 |
| 28 | Connecticut | 14.9% | 17.5% | 2.6 |
| 29 | Nevada | 14.9% | 17.6% | 2.7 |
| 30 | Hawaii | 15.2% | 18.0% | 2.9 |
| 31 | Virginia | 15.2% | 18.1% | 2.9 |
| 32 | Arizona | 17.5% | 20.4% | 2.9 |
| 33 | Alaska | 14.0% | 17.0% | 3.1 |
| 34 | Colorado | 13.4% | 16.5% | 3.1 |
| 35 | Wyoming | 15.6% | 18.9% | 3.3 |
| 36 | Michigan | 16.9% | 20.2% | 3.3 |
| 37 | District of Columbia | 8.7% | 12.2% | 3.4 |
| 38 | Wisconsin | 19.4% | 22.9% | 3.5 |
| 39 | Maryland | 13.3% | 16.9% | 3.6 |
| 40 | Kansas | 14.9% | 18.6% | 3.7 |
| 41 | New York | 15.7% | 19.4% | 3.7 |
| 42 | North Carolina | 13.7% | 17.8% | 4.1 |
| 43 | South Carolina | 16.5% | 20.6% | 4.1 |
| 44 | Maine | 19.4% | 23.8% | 4.4 |
| 45 | Arkansas | 16.2% | 21.3% | 5.1 |
| 46 | New Mexico | 14.3% | 19.7% | 5.3 |
| 47 | Alabama | 14.5% | 20.1% | 5.6 |
| 48 | Illinois | 12.2% | 18.6% | 6.4 |
| 49 | Louisiana | 12.2% | 19.2% | 7.0 |
| 50 | North Dakota | 11.1% | 18.2% | 7.1 |
| 51 | Mississippi | 13.1% | 20.9% | 7.8 |
Source: MagnifyMoney analysis of U.S. Census Bureau Household Pulse Survey data. Notes: The 2020 survey was fielded from April 23 to May 5, 2020, while the 2022 survey was fielded from April 27 to May 9, 2022. Calculated percentage point differences might not match the subtraction of values due to rounding.
While some formerly retired workers may have chosen to start working again, less than half of those 65 and older are described as retired or working, per the Census Bureau data. There’s a significant population of older adults who fall outside the fluctuations of the labor market — they could be on disability, or perhaps have never been part of the workforce.
From October 2021: Americans 65 and older in these states are best positioned to retire.
It can be hard for some older folks to navigate the job market. As an example, many job listings are posted online on sites like Indeed or Monster that work as virtual help wanted sections. Plus, plenty of employers post jobs on their websites and take applications that must be submitted online.
Learning how to create a resume and cover letter on a computer and apply for jobs online is the first step to broadening your pool of potential jobs. Beyond that, AARP recommends that older job seekers “age-proof” their resumes, by limiting them to more recent job experience and removing graduation dates. On the other hand, older workers can market their mentoring skills when applying and interviewing for new jobs.
Regardless of your age, learning new skills or pursuing jobs in a different industry can help you find work. Certain jobs, such as school bus drivers, appeal to older adults who prefer to work on a part-time schedule, though they could require certification in the form of a commercial driver’s license or something similar. Reaching out to your social circle may help you identify which industries are hiring for roles that might be a good fit.
For those more interested in planning for retirement than reentering the workforce, finding a financial advisor could be a good start.
MagnifyMoney researchers analyzed data from the U.S. Census Bureau Household Pulse Survey. Specifically, we looked at survey data from Week 1 — fielded from April 23 to May 5, 2020 — and Week 45 — fielded from April 27 to May 9, 2022.
The survey asked respondents whether they were employed in the past seven days. We estimated the percentage of adults 65 and older employed in each U.S. state in both periods, and then ranked the states with the biggest jumps — by percentage points.
In addition to employee data, researchers analyzed retirement data at the national and state levels. Because this data isn’t available by age, any retirement data looks at all adults 18 and older.
Alex Cook
