Professional Organizations

More than a thousand age-based organizations exist in the United States at the national, state, and local levels. A number of such groups have emerged in other countries, such as Canada, as well as at the international level. These organizations are nonprofit collective entities with the betterment of persons age sixty and older as their objective (Liebig). However, not all have a professional orientation; many are consumer-based or consumer-focused advocacy groups. While most have "aging," "gerontology," or "geriatrics" in their name, others are not as easily identifiable, such as Generations United.

Organizations in aging can be classified as mass membership (such as AARP); special subgroups of older adults (the Older Women's League comes to mind); occupation-based or trade associations (the National Association of Retired Federal Employees and the American Association of Homes and Services for the Aging are examples); and professional groups of researchers and service providers (Day; Jaszczak; Krol; Van Tassel and Meyer; Wallace and Williamson). These organizations, associations, providers, professionals, and industries that serve elderly persons constitute "the aging enterprise" (Estes, 1979, 1993). They have been dubbed the "gray lobby" when they seek benefits from policymakers (Pratt).