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Myth of the Industrial Scrap Heap: A Revisionist View of Turn-of-the- Century American Retirement

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Susan B. Carter
Richard Sutch
Abstract

Using the census survival method to calculate net flows across employment states between 1900 and 1910, we find that approximately one-fifth of all men who reached the age of 55 eventually retired before their death. Many of these retirees appear to have planned their withdrawal from paid employment by accumulating assets, becoming self-employed, and then liquidating their assets to provide a stream of income to finance consumption in old age. This `modern' retirement behavior, we argue, has important implications for the economic history of capital and labor markets, of saving and investment, of insurance and pensions, and of the family economy.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Historical Working Papers with number 0073.

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Date of creation: Oct 1995
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Publication status: published as Carter, Susan B. and Richard Sutch. "Myth Of The Industrial Scrap Heap: A Revisionist View Of Turn-Of-The-Century American Retirement," Journal of Economic History, 1996, v56(1,Mar), 5-38.
Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberhi:0073

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  1. Parsons, Donald O, 1980. "The Decline in Male Labor Force Participation," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 88(1), pages 117-34, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Laurence J. Kotlikoff & Lawrence H. Summers, 1981. "The Role of Intergenerational Transfers in Aggregate Capital Accumulation," NBER Working Papers 0445, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  3. Dora L. Costa, 1994. "Agricultural Decline and the Secular Rise in Male Retirement Rates," NBER Historical Working Papers 0055, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Menchik, Paul L & David, Martin, 1983. "Income Distribution, Lifetime Savings, and Bequests," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 73(4), pages 672-90, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Michael R. Darby, 1978. "The Effects of Social Security on Income and the Capital Stock," UCLA Economics Working Papers 095, UCLA Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
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  6. Romer, Christina, 1986. "Spurious Volatility in Historical Unemployment Data," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(1), pages 1-37, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Hurd, Michael D, 1990. "Research on the Elderly: Economic Status, Retirement, and Consumption and Saving," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 28(2), pages 565-637, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Peracchi, Franco & Welch, Finis, 1994. "Trends in Labor Force Transitions of Older Men and Women," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 12(2), pages 210-42, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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