Retirement Migration and Precarity: Material and Social Aspects

Discussions of precarity in later life have tended to focus on the uncertainties of material resources, and the feelings of anxiety that this evokes (e.g., Lain et al. 2019) as some older people thus face the risk of being excluded from the broader society. Although scholars often point to inequalities, such as those based on class and gender, as having an influence on the likelihood of older people experiencing such precarity, ageism is considered only to the extent that it can exacerbate the impact of these statuses through, for instance, labor market experiences. Here, we expand upon the impact of ageism on the social aspects of precarity: the loss of recognition and respect as a person that is at the core of social bonds. Drawing on qualitative interviews we have conducted among Swiss, British, and U.S. older people who migrated to cheaper countries in retirement, we demonstrate that ageism can influence precarity regardless of classes. We find that even among wealthier older migrants, who otherwise might fit the image of the retiree seeking an active lifestyle in a sunny location, the attempt to escape the devaluation heaped upon older people in their original country plays an important role. In their new countries, retired migrants of all classes felt that they were valued and part of a community, and this differed from the ageism in their home countries. We thus argue that ageism be considered in future analyses of precarity in later life.

How Prospective International Retired Migrants Use Tourism for Decision Making

Despite the current importance of international retirement migration for both academics and practitioners, the extant literature on the topic is still scarce and mostly focused on short-period migration flows from wealthy and northern countries to cheaper and warm-weather destinations. This article aims at shedding light on the role of tourism in prospective migrants’ decision-making process, considering the framework provided by the push-pull model, which is often used to explain both migration and tourism. A qualitative study was conducted, comprising ten in-depth interviews with 45+ year-old Brazilian citizens who intend to move to Europe after retirement. Results show that tourism is important for prospective migrants to evaluate possible migration destinations, as some of the most relevant migration pull factors (e.g., safety) are easily assessed during tourism experiences. Participants in this study also carefully plan tourism activities prior to their decision to migrate in order to get a more realistic notion of what the destination is like for residents. Overall, this study demonstrates that tourism is particularly important for several stages of migrants’ decision-making process.

Examining Opportunities, Challenges and Quality of Life in International Retirement Migration

As the world has become more interconnected due to the invention and innovation of communication and transportation technologies, more individuals than ever before have been able to travel long distances. In recent years, a growing number of physically able adults in late adulthood have chosen to move across national borders to less costly countries in order to obtain better quality of life upon reaching retirement age. In light of this under-researched but increasingly popular retirement trajectory, this research aimed to provide more insight into the opportunities and challenges that international retired migrants have encountered while retiring abroad. Through the lens of humanistic theory, this research employed a systematic review of research literature, the majority of which were peer-reviewed studies published within the last five years. The reviewed studies (n = 22) conducted spanned four out of seven continents, with heavy emphasis on Europe, the Americas, and Asia. Research results indicated that many of the international retired migrants took advantage of the opportunities of pleasant weather, lower cost of living, and various amenities offered by their host countries to enhance their quality of life by engaging in an active and meaningful lifestyle. However, language barriers, lack of social support, rising healthcare costs, increases in the cost of living, uncertain political climate, and different healthcare practices in their host countries, presented considerable challenges to many international retirees.

New frontiers in international retirement migration

Introducing the special issue, this paper provides a state-of-the-art on established and new trends in the study of international retirement migration (IRM) and summarises the five papers that follow. Early studies on IRM were mainly within Europe and drew on the conceptual framework of lifestyle migration, with some reference to the transnational and mobilities paradigms. New frontiers in IRM are presented under three heads. Firstly, new geographical frontiers extend IRM to new destinations within and proximate to Europe, and to new locations in the global South such as Thailand and Ecuador. Secondly, new typological frontiers involve a broadening of the class and wealth backgrounds of the retirees, including the ‘return of retirement’ of labour migrants to their countries of origin, and attentiveness to IRM's gendered aspects. Thirdly, new conceptual and theoretical frontiers of IRM involve a more in-depth investigation of its transnational aspects, exploration of the various regimes of mobility and, most importantly, a political economy perspective which stresses global inequalities and histories of colonialism in shaping access to privileged lifestyles. In the final part of the paper, the original features of each paper in the special issue are highlighted, demonstrating how they are collectively integrated and contribute to the advancement of IRM research.

British and Japanese international retirement migration and creative responses to health and care challenges: a bricolage perspective

Most research on international retirement migration has focused on the Western context and the motivations and lifestyle choices of migrants when they are healthy. This paper instead explores how British retirees in Spain and Japanese retirees in Malaysia respond to declining health and increasing care needs through bricolage as they begin to ‘age in place’. The paper combines qualitative interviews, focus groups and observations collected by the authors from 215 British and Japanese international retirement migrants. We focus on two key types of bricolage behaviour: ‘within-system bricolage’ undertaken by migrants to help them access and navigate existing health and care systems; and ‘added-to-system bricolage’ that is enacted to fill gaps in health and care provision. Our analysis suggests that IRMs engage in ‘transnational care bricolage’ by combining multiple economic, social and legal resources across local and transnational spaces to address their health and care needs.