Economic hardship across the life course

We test two hypotheses about the relationship between age and reported diff iculty paying bills or buying things the family needs, such as food, clothi ng, medicine, and medical care. The affluence-trajectory hypothesis follows from age-group differences in income, income per capita, and official pove rty, suggesting that economic hardship declines in successively older age g roups lip to late middle age but then rises. The adequacy-gradient hypothes is follows from research suggesting a progressively favorable balance of re sources relative to needs in successively older age groups, suggesting that economic hardship declines progressively in successively older age groups. Two U.S. surveys (1990 and 1995) find a progressive decline in economic ha rdship in successively older age groups consistent with the adequacy-gradie nt hypothesis. Most age-group differences in economic hardship appear attri butable to differences in the presence of children in the home, in resource s such as homeownership and medical insurance, and in behaviors such as mod eration and thrift.