The Graying of Orange County Is Underway

A demographic trend with enormous strategic and policy implications in Orange County is the aging of the population boomers born between 1946 and ‘65, and the population busters born between 1965 and ’80. This aging of the boomers and busters will be particularly pronounced in Orange County because of the sharp increase in immigration that took place in the county between the 1950s and ‘60s. As a result of the influx of people during those decades, the birthrate increased sharply, thereby making the bulge of the baby boomers in Orange County even more extreme.

The aging of the boomers and busters from 2000 to 2020 suggests that the peak in the boomers will move from the 30-to-39 age group into the 50-to-59 group by 2020, while the busters will move from the 10-to-19 group into the 30-to-39 group by 2020.

As a result of these aging patterns, the population of the over-60 age group will increase from 391,000 this year to 733,000 by 2020 and to even higher numbers beyond 2020. Already, Orange County ranks eighth among the U.S. counties in the number of seniors over age 65. In contrast, the population within the 30-to-39 group will decline from 509,000 to 357,000 by 2020.

The economic implications of these aging patters are many and varied. For example, the sharp drop in the 30-to-39 age group and concomitant rise in the over-60 group point to obvious changes in the demand for housing in the county. There will be a drop in demand for housing resulting from the decline by 152,000 people forming families and households in the 30-to-39 age cohort.

Demand for senior citizen housing, however, will increase sharply as a result of 342,000 more people over 60 by 2020. This increase strongly suggests that builders in the county should be giving increased attention to the changing housing demand patterns of the over-60 crowd.

Given the longer and more active life of these seniors, this does not necessarily point only to assisted-care housing. A growing trend will be the development of senior housing and residential communities built around a lifestyle that is more active and involves more social activities. As seniors’ health, interests and abilities allow them to be more independent, they will demand social and physical spaces such as workout rooms, spas, walking trails, swimming pools, body conditioning and other amenities in their residential housing.

The large number and percentage of people entering the over-60 age group in 2020 is also a national phenomenon. Because the population aging is a U.S. trend, the demand for products and services produced by companies that cater to the health care needs of the elderly should flourish.

This is where Orange County has a strategic advantage.

The growth of the medical instruments industry in Orange County has been nothing sort of phenomenal. By 1992, we employed nearly as many medical instrument workers (8,838) as Los Angeles County (9,413)--a county more than three times our size. Today, Orange County has only 1.3% of U.S. manufacturing jobs, but about 4% of the nation’s jobs in the medical instruments and supplies sector. Orange County may have more jobs in this industry than any other county in the nation.

As longevity increases, the demand for affordable home health-care aides and supportive services is expected to double between now and 2020. Orange County-based companies such as Apria Healthcare will help ensure the county’s leadership in this rapidly growing industry.

As an example of the responsiveness of the community to this growth industry, Chapman University recently announced the establishment of the Warren Hancock Endowed Chair in Cardiovascular Sciences. This chair is named in honor of a man who was a pioneer in the medical products industry in Orange County, having established Hancock Laboratories in the 1960s.

Strategically positioning the university for the future health care of our region also explains why Chapman acquired the nation’s oldest nationally accredited program in physical therapy and brought it to the Orange campus in 1994.

The socioeconomic implications of the dramatic and divergent trends in the county’s age profile are many and varied. It is only through careful planning that public and private institutions can respond effectively to the emerging trends that we will face in the first score of years of the 21st century.