More than 1 in 4 workers in New Hampshire are age 55 and older, the highest percentage among the states. With this comes challenges to ensure the state replenishes its future workforce and takes advantage of opportunities to strengthen its current one.

The Business & Industry Association is New Hampshire’s statewide chamber of commerce and leading nonpartisan business advocate with more than 400 members in industries across the state. Our members routinely rank the workforce shortage and related housing shortage as their biggest challenges. That’s why BIA is working aggressively to identify and support solutions to both issues, large and small, near-term and long-term.

Creating a balanced housing market and reversing declining post-secondary education enrollments are critical, but fall more into the long-term category. Immediate solutions may be incremental, but they’re essential.

I had the opportunity to be part of AARP New Hampshire’s caregiving panel discussion this past spring and it reminded me how the biggest challenges require the greatest community input and a mix of solutions. AARP NH has 212,000 members in the state, representing nearly 37% of the age 50-plus demographic. Its diverse suite of services and programs includes efforts to keep Granite Staters in the workforce longer. A key element is working with businesses to promote the value of older workers and how best to attract and retain them. Many workers over 50 face the reality of having to provide care to elderly parents or disabled spouses.

Adopting policies that help workers balance their work and caregiving responsibilities can help employers address their workforce needs.

“Flexibility is important,” said Christina FitzPatrick, state director for AARP NH. “And that’s something that is valued across the workforce, not only by family caregivers.”

AARP’s Employer Resource Center details how employers can support care-giving employees so they can stay in the workforce. Resources include the educational white paper, “The Business Case for a Caregiver-Friendly Workplace.” It states employers can boost employee productivity, recruit new talent and help their business grow by embracing caregiving-friendly strategies and solutions.

FitzPatrick said many things go into allowing the elderly to stay at home beyond in-home medical care, including transportation to doctor’s appointments and assistance with tasks of daily living. Providing help can require caregivers to adjust their daily work schedules. Employers with policies allowing flexibility of in-office and remote work, flex-time schedules and use of paid time off to care for loved ones have a recruitment and retainment advantage and see higher levels of productivity, FitzPatrick said.

“There are a lot of low-cost strategies employers can use to support family caregivers,” she said. “Implementing policies like these can increase employee loyalty and engagement.”

The population of New Hampshire residents aged 70 to 74 increased by 29,075 between 2013 and 2023, by far the largest increase of all five-year age brackets. And the aging population will only increase the number of professionals who must balance work obligations with caregiving commitments. There are currently 38 million caregivers in the United States and 61% are still working.

Advocacy is big part of AARP’s work and that drives conversations around aging. FitzPatrick said that requires an understanding of how a variety of sectors, including housing, transportation, health care and civic engagement, will need to adapt to an aging population.

“We don’t need wholesale changes,” she said. “Just a better understanding of how the public and private sector and individuals can come together to deal with the challenges.”

Raising awareness of what businesses can do is a priority for AARP and that begins with educating managers about family caregiving and the burdens it entails and sharing with them specific strategies for supporting them. AARP also promotes research that shows multi-generational work teams find solutions more quickly and see higher productivity.

The value of older workers has never been higher as New Hampshire works toward long-term solutions to its workforce shortage. These highly skilled and experienced professionals not only help stabilize the workforce overall, but they are also passing along critical wisdom to the younger generations.

Businesses and other employers can learn more about AARP NH’s workforce resources and programs at https://states.aarp.org/new-hampshire/.

Michael Skelton is president and CEO of the Business & Industry Association. Visit BIAofNH.com.

NOTE: This column first appeared in Business NH Magazine's November edition.