A recent study with Finnish administrative data suggests that the hypotheses of divergence and convergence in socioeconomic disparities in health at older ages may not be mutually exclusive. They may depend on the measure of health disparities used and the ages of the populations studied. In the study, socioeconomic disparities first diverged with age but started to converge at very old ages.

Men and women with higher education, household income, and occupational class had fewer hospital days in 1988 than those with lower SES. Hospital days increased between 1988 and 2007. For some age groups, higher SES was associated with a faster annual rate of increase, resulting in narrowing rate ratios of hospital days between