Much economic research stresses the role of pensions and Social Security in inducing retirement-altering the labor supply of older workers. Yet there are also demand-side effects that make firms unwilling to allow most workers to ease out.
A recent paper by David Blau and Tetyana Shvydko demonstrates this very neatly. At firms with large shares of young women (which Blau and Shvydko hypothesize are also firms with flexible work policies), older workers are less likely to leave for full retirement. The chance for a flexible work schedule alters older workers’ behavior,?driving them to stay in the workforce for longer. Given the long-term problems of Social Security and other pension schemes, this research shows there are alternatives to fiddling with pension programs and Social Security benefits that could go some way toward getting older people to stay at work. People may argue that this is bad in a recession; but eventually we will have skill shortages, and keeping older people at work is a good way to minimize them.
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Young women and old guys — yep, I bet these companies see some hefty health insurance premiums.
Well can’t really blame the old guys. Women seem to also enjoy old men companies.
Keeping older people at work seems like a short sighted way to solve a skill shortage. Won’t this strategy inevitably limit new hires, which will send a message to younger workers that the particular skills needed for these jobs are not marketable and not worth acquiring? Your old workers will eventually retire and at that point there certainly won’t be anyone to hire with these skill sets that have been discouraged.
Both extended lifespan and the Baby Boom demographic seems to fit in here: there are literally more people 50 and older than than there ever were, and they are a higher proportion of the population. So if businesses need good employees, they will have to make accommodations for those who would otherwise retire completely.
By working longer, older people stay productive and give back to the economy instead of being a burden on the already ailing social security system.
With the economy being like it is, how much longer are people willing to work at such an old age? At some point wouldn’t you think health could possibly become an issue? I would think that at an older age person might start loosing their efficiency of getting a certain type of job done.
In this age of diversity, it seems like a no brainer that you need some old folks around – as well as young folks & middle folks.
At firms with large quantities of young women, the environment at the job may be very social, and older women may be included. Thus, the older workers may stay on the job because they reap social benefits even if the work is unpleasant. The older workers may not go to the happy hour confabs regularly, but they may be included in the lunch chat groups. There are probably lots of showers (for weddings and babies).
Such workplaces may only be moderately flexible (no flex time, but a choice of shifts, such as 7-4 and 9-6, for instance). Or, there’s no work-at-home option as a full-time option, but a work-at-home option keeps the department operating through snow days or flu epidemics — so the commute can’t be eliminated, but few people have to report to the office if the weather is horrible.
At workplaces with a lot of young women, the older workers may be underemployed women. I would be very surprised if the older workers were mostly men, unless the older workers who aren’t retiring are in management.