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Transitions out of and back to employment among older men and women in the UK

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Abstract

This paper analyses the labour market transitions of older men and women using data from the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS). I find large peaks in exit rates out of employment at ages 60 (women) and 65 (both sexes) which occur in the exact birthday month. This suggests that pension schemes have strong incentive effects. Discrete-time hazard regression analysis shows that benefits and health status are the two most important determinants of retirement, with effects that are larger than found in previous studies for British and US men. When modelling unobserved heterogeneity I find that the share of ‘movers’ between work and non-work is twice as high among women as among men.

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  • Haardt, David, 2006. "Transitions out of and back to employment among older men and women in the UK," ISER Working Paper Series 2006-20, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    • Handle: RePEc:ese:iserwp:2006-20
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    1. Cai, Lixin & Mavromaras, Kostas & Oguzoglu, Umut, 2008. "The Effects of Health and Health Shocks on Hours Worked," IZA Discussion Papers 3496, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. David Haardt, 2007. "Older Couples' Labour Market Reactions to Family Disruptions," Social and Economic Dimensions of an Aging Population Research Papers 198, McMaster University.
    3. Cappellari, Lorenzo & Dorsett, Richard & Haile, Getinet, 2007. "State dependence, duration dependence and unobserved heterogeneity in the employment transitions of the over-50s," ISER Working Paper Series 2007-16, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    4. David Haardt, 2007. "Cognitive functioning and labour force participation among older men and women in England," Social and Economic Dimensions of an Aging Population Research Papers 222, McMaster University.
    5. Sergi Jiménez Martín & Judit Vall Castello, 2009. "Business Cycle Effects on Labour Force Transitions for Older People in Spain," Working Papers 2009-25, FEDEA.
    6. Leora Friedberg & Michael Owyang & Anthony Webb, 2008. "Identifying Local Differences in Retirement Patterns," Working Papers, Center for Retirement Research at Boston College wp2008-18, Center for Retirement Research, revised Dec 2008.
    7. Leora Friedberg & Michael T. Owyang & Wei Sun & Anthony Webb, 2017. "How Do Local Labor Markets Affect Retirement?," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 99(3), pages 259-278.
    8. Lixin Cai & Kostas Mavromaras & Umut Oguzoglu, 2014. "The Effects Of Health Status And Health Shocks On Hours Worked," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 23(5), pages 516-528, May.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • J14 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of the Elderly; Economics of the Handicapped; Non-Labor Market Discrimination
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • J26 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Retirement; Retirement Policies

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