American Association of Retired Persons (AARP)

The American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) is a not-for-profit organization started by Ethel Percy Andrus for people at or close to retirement age. Membership is estimated to be over 38 million people. Wanting to remain active and productive in her retirement, Andrus founded the National Retired Teachers Association (NRTA) in 1947 to provide group health insurance for educator retirees. By 1958, the organization came to be known as AARP, within which NRTA later became a division. AARP expanded from offering health insurance to other health-related and consumer discounts and products to its membership. Andrus attempted to establish the organization internationally as the Association of Retired Persons International (ARPI). While ARPI disbanded shortly after its inception, AARP continues to have an international impact through the participation of non-US citizens in its membership and the organizations and advocacy that it has inspired in other countries.

Brief History

In 1944, Andrus retired after three decades as a school principal to care for her ill mother. Being a caretaker alerted Andrus to the needs of older people, leading her to do welfare work with the California Retired Teachers Association. When Andrus started the NRTA in 1947, private health insurance was almost completely unavailable to older citizens. Andrus was surprised to learn this included many of her fellow retirees from education who also subsisted on pensions that were inadequate for managing the extra costs associated with healthcare. Also in 1947, the US government had just enacted The Labor-Management Relations Act of 1947 to guide and encourage the joint establishment of employer/union-administered pension plans. Medicare, a government administered healthcare insurance program for citizens aged sixty-five and older who have paid into the system, was not enacted until 1965.

Andrus started NRTA with the goal of offering group health insurance to fellow retired educators through the organization, which also aimed to give retirees a national voice. Andrus approached and was turned down by dozens of insurance companies that were unwilling to take the risk of insuring older Americans. Andrus could not find health insurance for her retirees until she collaborated with Leonard Davis, who had succeeded for his group of retired New York teachers. Policy subscriptions tripled in 1956, which was the first year they were offered by the then Continental Casualty Company, which found the NRTA members to be reliable customers. The health plan became so popular that noneducator retirees wanted to purchase into the plan. In 1958, Andrus expanded the organization to all retirees, rebranding it as AARP. Davis provided startup money to create a company publication, Modern Maturity.

Impact

In 1958, the AARP was founded to foster collective voice, purpose, and purchasing power and was founded on three principles: to promote independence, dignity, and purpose for older persons; to enhance the quality of life for older persons; to encourage older people "To serve, not to be served." The latter of these three principles became the personal motto of Andrus, who died in July 1967 and was said to have lived her life according to a philosophy of productive aging. By 1968, one year after Andrus’ death, AARP had a million and a half members and had accepted an application for its 500th local group, the first having been founded in 1960.

The AARP has since expanded its activities beyond group health insurance to mail-order drug service, lifetime learning, and car insurance benefits, as well as publications to its members. The organization has unsuccessfully attempted to offer various initiatives, including a credit union, a travel service, and a cellular phone service. In 1982, the AARP and the NRTA merged at the national level, and NRTA became a division of AARP. NRTA maintains collaborative working relationships with state and local Retired Educators Associations (REAs). More recently, NRTA and its REAs celebrated AARP’s Fiftieth anniversary by providing an outstanding high school in each of the fifty states with a $10,000 grant for multigenerational and civic engagement activities.

In the mid-2020s, over 17 percent of the United States population was sixty-five or older, around fifty-eight million people. Conventional wisdom holds that older Americans are more likely to vote, contributing to AARP’s well-founded reputation as one of the most powerful lobbying groups in the United States. Furthermore, AARP has continued to network and to promote the well-being of older persons internationally. AARP has inspired similar organizations in Canada (Canadian Association of Retired Persons) and Britain (British Association of Retired Persons). AARP counts Canadian citizens among its members. AARP is the United States’s leading organization for people aged fifty and above, to whom it offers education, advocacy, and community services.

Bibliography

“Ethel Percy Andrus: The Extraordinary Woman Who Changed America.” AARP, www.aarp.org/about-aarp/history/ethel-percy-andrus-biography.html. Accessed 2 Jan. 2025.

Flinn, Lee. “The History of AARP.” AARP, 6 Dec. 2012, states.aarp.org/the-history-of-aarp. Accessed 2 Jan. 2025.

Hayes, Adam. “AARP: Overview, Affiliates, Lobbying for Members Age 50+.” Investopedia, 20 Feb. 2024, www.investopedia.com/terms/a/aarp.asp. Accessed 2 Jan. 2025.

“Population - Age 65+ in United States.” America's Health Rankings, www.americashealthrankings.org/explore/measures/pct‗65plus. Accessed 2 Jan. 2025.