Page 18 - increasing-the-value-of-age-guidance-in-employers-age-management-strategies

Increasing the value of age: guidance in employers’ age management strategies

CHAPTER 1.

Introduction to the study

1.1. Active age management: changing paradigms

EU Member States policies have, for a long time, actively contributed to a
reduction in the contribution of older workers. Governments and their social
partners developed a mutual interest in promoting early retirement as a general
remedy, against the backdrop of the 1973 oil crisis coupled with the decline of
several economic industries, an increase in unemployment and excess supply of
younger workers since the mid-1970s.
Measurements such as preretirement in Denmark and Germany and the
early retirement and job release schemes in the Netherlands and the UK actively
encouraged early exit from the labour force. Employment of older people has also
been negatively affected by the imposition of a uniform mandatory age of
retirement in several countries (Avramov and Maskova, 2003).
These policies have significantly contributed to the steady reduction in
labour participation by older workers (aged 55-64) since the 1970s. After two
decades participation stabilised at the all-time low of about 37% in the early
1
1990s ( ) and remained at this level between 1992 and 2000. This has been
labelled the age/employment paradox: while life expectancy in the EU has
increased significantly since the 1950s, labour force participation by older people
has dropped dramatically (Walker, 2001).
A change in policy began to take shape from the early-1990s onwards,
partially due to rising social security costs, a foreseen increase in population
ageing, and future shortages in labour and skills. It also became generally
recognised that the early retirement schemes proved ineffective and very costly
for society (Walker, 2001; Davey, 2002; Avramov and Maskova, 2003).

1.2. Active age management in policy

Countries developed policies to increase the participation of older workers by:
(a) increasing the pension age, limiting preretirement incentives;

1
( ) Walker, 2001; von Nordheim, 2003; Avramov and Maskova, 2003. See also Eurostat
database on employment rate of older workers by sex (online data code tsiem020)
http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/portal/page/portal/statistics/search_database

12