Esser, Ingrid (Swedish Institute for Social Research (SOFI))
Abstract
The combination of greying populations, decreasing fertility rates and a marked trend in falling retirement age is profoundly challenging the sharing of resources and supporting responsibilities between generations in the developed world. Previous studies on earlier exit-trends have focused mainly on supply-side incentives and generally conclude that people will exit given available retirement options. Substantial cross-national variations in exit-ages however remain unexplained. This suggests that also normative factors such as attitudes to work and retirement might be of importance. Through multi-level analyses, this study evaluates how welfare regime generosity, as well as production regime coordination explains cross-national patterns of retirement preferences across twelve Western European countries. Analysis firstly shows how both men and women on average prefer to retire at 58 years, meaning on average approximately 7 or 5.5 years before statutory retirement age in the case of men and women respectively. Contrary to what is expected from previous research on supply-side factors, preferences for relatively later retirement is found within more generous welfare regimens and also within more extensively coordinated production regimes. For women, however, institutional effects do not remain once substantial cross-national differences in women's statutory retirement ages are taken into account.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
file. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
Publisher Info
Paper provided by Institute for Futures Studies in its series Arbetsrapport with number
2005:9.
Length: 50 pages Date of creation: Jun 2005 Date of revision: Handle: RePEc:hhs:ifswps:2005_009
Note: ISSN 1652-120X ISBN 91-89655-67-2 Contact details of provider: Postal: Institute for Futures Studies, Box 591, SE-101 31 Stockholm, Sweden Phone: 08-402 12 00 Fax: 08-24 50 14 Email: Web page: http://www.framtidsstudier.se More information through EDIRC
For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its listing, contact: (Sabina Nilsson).