SHARE

• Applicant: Professor Axel Börsch-Supan, Ph.D.
• Subject Area: Empirical Social Research ; Public Health, Healthcare Research, Social and Occupational Medicine ; Economic Policy, Applied Economics
• Term: since 2016
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 279507623

SHARE, the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe, is a comparative pan-European survey aimed at documenting and better understanding the repercussions of demographic ageing for individuals and society as a whole, and forming a sound scientific basis for countermeasures adopted by health and social policy. SHARE uses strictly harmonised methods to collect data on the health, economic status and social integration of persons aged 50 and over in 20 European countries. The focus is on the interdependence of these characteristics. The conceptual background of SHARE implies (a) an extensive thematic and multidisciplinary scope with measurements that are as objective as possible, (b) longitudinality, and (c) strict cross-national comparability with ex-ante harmonised survey tools and methods. This set-up enables the users of SHARE to perform comparative analyses of the causes for, and the effects of, social, economic and health-related developments in the course of demographic change on an international scale. The objective of this proposal is the integration of the German survey as a central and indispensable part of a pan-European survey into the DFG Langzeitprogramm. Germany is not only the largest country in Europe, but also a nation with a particularly fast-ageing population. Moreover, Germany has the largest number of SHARE users and generates a more than proportional share of SHARE-based publications. Finally, Germany hosts the headquarters of the SHARE Coordination. Without Germany, SHARE is therefore unable to exist. The German survey has been restarted in 2013 with a new survey agency and a large new baseline sample. This application concerns the establishment of this sample as a panel to be started in 2015.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: Croatia, Denmark, France, Israel, Italy, Spain
• Co-Investigator: Dr. Karin Schuller
• Cooperation Partners: Karen Andersen-Ranberg, Ph.D.; Professorin Agar Brugiavini; Professorin Florence Jusot; Anne Laferrère; Professor Howie Litwin; Professor Pedro Mira; Sime Smolic, Ph.D.; Professor Guglielmo Weber, Ph.D.