Work till you drop? A note on the potential and limits of employment adjustment to demographic change

Abstract

Purpose

How will labour markets adapt to population ageing? The demographic shift to be experienced over coming decades requires some sort of adjustment in working lives to balance increased longevity. But where in the lifecycle should this adjustment take place? It often seems to be assumed that ever‐longer working lives are the only answer: the purpose of this article is to query this assumption and to suggest that there should be a balance of employment and other uses of time across the entire lifecycle.

Design/methodology/approach

The article analyses the impact of increased economic activity on the dependency ratio and it identifies plausible upper bounds to employment objectives by age and gender using international comparative data.

Findings

Increased employment for over‐65s is likely to have limited impact on age dependency ratio: bigger impacts would be expected from the 55‐65 age group and younger women.

Originality/value

The article brings comparative evidence to bear on labour market implications of population ageing.

Citation

Gaffney, D. (2012), "Work till you drop? A note on the potential and limits of employment adjustment to demographic change", Quality in Ageing and Older Adults, Vol. 13 No. 4, pp. 275-281. https://doi.org/10.1108/14717791211286959