We all know that people today are having to work into much older age. Since the early 2000s there has been a trend towards working longer, as a result of rising pension ages, a reduction in financial support for those leaving work early and other financial pressures.
We also know that governments in Europe often present this as being unproblematic, as if people simply need to work a few more years in their jobs. However, it is not always that straightforward, as not everyone will be in a secure job that they will be able to continue doing into older age. This was illustrated by the disproportionate increase in economic inactivity among UK over-50s since the pandemic began. So what happens to people, and what are their experiences, when they cannot simply continue working a bit longer in a job; when they need to make a ‘job transition’ in older age and move into new work?
Recent research by a number of scholars, including myself, has highlighted the challenges older workers face when attempting to make job transitions. This draws on qualitative research to explore the ‘lived experiences’ of older workers in a range of European countries. Job transitions can be defined broadly to include job redeployment and job mobility, temporary employment, attempted transitions from unemployment, work beyond state pension age and transitions into retirement.
A key argument that has emerged from this research is that job experiences of older workers reflect the wider context of ‘neoliberal responsibilisation’. This political trend has shifted responsibility onto the older person to ‘choose’ to take whatever job opportunities are available to them, while providing limited support to help them make such transitions. To illustrate what we mean by this, let’s take the example of age discrimination legislation, which in some countries has led to an abolition of mandatory retirement ages. The way in which this abolition is often presented has been about enabling people to choose to work longer. At the same time, however, financial opportunities that would facilitate a choice to stop working have declined, because state pension ages have risen and access to health and unemployment benefits have reduced. In this context, narratives about ‘freedom’ are used by policy makers and employers to get older people to take greater responsibility for their employment outcomes, while ignoring the reality that age discrimination and a host of other factors continue to restrict individuals’ real opportunities.
Notions of ‘freedom’, ‘choice’ and ‘responsibility’ are reflected in the language used by some older workers, while others express their circumstances in less positive terms. In any case, older workers often appear to respond to the need to make work-related transitions through ‘psychological reactance’. In other words, under conditions of uncertainty, and while needing to continue working, individuals strive to restore personal control by taking whatever job opportunities are available to them.
Take, for example, the case of older workers in a UK local government authority facing austerity. Some had lost their previous roles in a restructuring process and had to compete for new jobs internally via a redeployment scheme. HR presented redeployment as offering opportunities for all ages, but older workers rarely saw it in this way and none of those interviewed had progressed upwards as a result of it. As Mary, aged 56, said, “there was quite a lot of feeling… that it was the people over 50 who didn’t get the jobs”. In this context, some older individuals who had lost their previous roles sought to restore certainty in an anxiety-inducing situation by taking lower-level or less desirable jobs through redeployment.
We also see other examples of older people who are resigned to the fact they have reduced options because of their age, but who still seek out opportunities that are available to them. Serge, 54, a temporary worker in Belgium, illustrated this when he said: “at my age I didn’t have much chance of finding a stable job… The only solution that was interesting for [my employer] was to hire me as a temporary worker”. Sonia, also in Belgium, a highly educated woman aged 48, had taken temporary employment because she’d been unable to secure permanent work: “I’ve got used to the idea; there’s nothing to be done about it.”
More broadly, we see older workers facing some similar constraints across countries that have historically been categorised as having different ‘welfare states’ and ‘varieties of capitalism’. This includes individuals on the margins of employment struggling in the face of adversity to continue working; older workers failing to benefit from ‘positive’ internal job mobility; and divorced women continuing to work past pension age for financial reasons. We also see inequalities emerge between older people in this context of ‘choice’ and ‘responsibility’, with financial resources influencing whether you have to continue working up to, and perhaps beyond, rising pension ages.
Clearly job transitions don’t offer the freedom to continue working that is often assumed. In the context of United Nations Sustainable Development goals, this raises important concerns about the impact of job transitions on efforts to reduce inequalities in older age and provide decent work for all. It is therefore important to go beyond the aggregated statistics, to examine how work is experienced and navigated by older people in the current neoliberal policy and employment landscape.
David Lain is a Senior Lecturer in Employment Studies at Newcastle University Business School.
Older Workers in Transition by David Lain, Sarah Vickerstaff and Mariska van der Horst is available on the Bristol University Press website. Order here for £80.00.
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