Spaeker: Vegard Skirbekk, Columbia University
The Committee on Global Thought (CGT) Lunchtime Seminars are a forum for Columbia University faculty and visiting scholars to discuss current research characterizing and assessing issues of global importance. Open to Columbia affiliates only. No registration is required. Light lunch will be available.
Vegard Skirbekk is a professor at Columbia University and a senior researcher at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health. His work is focused on working towards understanding the links between aging and workers productivity with the goal of improving senior workers’ skills is critical to countries with aging populations. Dr. Skirbekk’s research in this area, which examines the relationships of skills and work performance, emphasizes how population aging – at the macro level – is influenced by more than biological age processes. Productivity measured against the biological age of a workforce is one aspect of the project; however, this is not a straightforward assessment. Countries with better educated populations, for example, tend to have older people with greater cognitive skill levels than countries whose populations are less well educated. This research identified that based on functional level than outcomes, the U.S. and Northern Europe are effectively younger than India or China (both of which have chronologically younger age structures than Europe), following factors such as differential investments in education and health.
Learn more about the CGT Lunchtime Seminars at their website.
