Aging Populations, Globalization and the Labor Market

by Blossfeld, Hans-Peter; Buchholz, Sandra; Kurz, Karin

• ISBN13: 9781849803724
• ISBN10: 1849803722
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2011-11-11
• Publisher: Edward Elgar Pub

Summary

'Welfare states react to globalization and adapt to aging populations by reducing early retirement pathways and public benefits. How have these changes affected the transition to and income situation during retirement? To investigate this crucial question, this eminent international team conducted sophisticated micro-level analyses of retirement patterns and old age inequality across Europe and the USA. For anyone wishing to understand the significant cross-national differences that determine employment precariousness and social inequality in old age, this book is a must-read.' Bernhard Ebbinghaus, University of Mannheim, Germany This topical and timely analysis of late career and retirement within nine European societies and the USA examines how social inequality structures have developed in an era of globalization and aging populations. For several decades, many European societies relied on pushing and luring older workers out of employment by using generous early retirement programs in order to relieve national labor markets in times of globalization. However, as this book argues, one of the major challenges facing European and Northern American societies today is their severe demographic aging, which in turn places pension systems under substantial pressure due to the rising imbalance between those claiming pensions and those contributing to the pension system. Indeed, it is observed herein that in the recent past, governments have tried to increase the labor market attachment of older employees by retrenching early retirement benefits. This study investigates how these developments have impacted on the situation of older workers and retirees in nine European societies and the USA. In particular, the book looks at how social inequalities in later life have developed in the light of recent pension reforms. This informative book will appeal to sociologists, demographers, political scientists and economists interested in many different aspects of research including: international comparative research, globalization, labor market, welfare state, social inequality and research on aging. Researchers in the field of retirement and globalization studies will also find this book helpful, as will academics in labor market research and comparative political studies.