In the United States of America and in the republics of the former USSR, the elderly (persons aged 60 and over) will comprise the same proportion of their respective societies by the year 2000, namely 17%. In both countries, this population subgroup is growing at a faster rate than the rest of the population and living longer, although there are now more differences than similarities between the two countries in respect of the elderly, as summarized below. Similarities. In both countries today, the age group 50 years and over represents 26% of the total population, and by the year 2000 it is expected that 17% of the population will be 60 years and over. Diseases of the circulatory system and neoplasms are the major causes of death in both countries. Life expectancy beyond retirement age (i.e. the number of years a person is expected to live after having retired) is about the same in both, but this is due to the statistical fact that in the former USSR women are expected to have an extra year of life expectancy compared to their United States counterparts, while men are expected to live 2.5 years less beyond retirement than their United States counterparts. Differences. Mortality rates in the former USSR are higher than those in the United States. Life expectancy for men in the former USSR is 6.5 years below the figure for United States males. By age 65, the differences are 2.7 years for women and 2.4 years for men. Today, the proportion of the population having reached retirement age is larger in the former USSR than in the United States (17% vs 15%) because of lower retirement age in the former USSR. By the year 2000, these figures are expected to be 19% and 25%, respectively. Men make up 27% of the pension-age population in the former USSR against 41% in the United States. Life expectancy at birth could increase by 4 years for men in the former USSR if they had the same mortality rates from diseases of the circulatory and respiratory systems as their United States counterparts. Similarly, women in the former USSR would gain 4 years of life from these two causes alone. Older women are more likely to be married in the United States than in the former USSR, and this difference increases with age: at age 65, 25% of the former USSR's women are married versus 41% in the United States.