Gendered and extended work: research and policy needs for work in later life

The conclusion briefly summarises the contributions of each of the individual country chapters; to highlight major cross-national similarities and differences; to emphasise topics where more research is needed to better understand the myriad implications of extended working lives, and to consider some policy directions that could improve prospects for extended working life by countering the increasing polarisation of later life opportunities which current policy trajectories will create. While not denying the materially better conditions in Sweden or the United States than, say, Portugal or Ireland, there is not as much variation across the countries covered as might otherwise have been expected when extended working life is considered through a gendered lens. If older women's disadvantage is to be minimised or addressed, it is certain that the private sector alone cannot accomplish that. Only governments can redistribute resources and life chances in ways that would give future women (and vulnerable men) a fighting chance at good employment in later life and adequate income in old age.

Sweden: an extended working life policy that overlooks gender considerations

The Swedish government policy on extended working life has since its introduction in the mid-1990s aimed to lower the costs of the public pension system and to reduce the financial burden for workers. By focusing on an idealised category of those who are "willing and able to work longer", the policy has neglected the obstacles faced by those with physically demanding jobs or with a big responsibility to care for a close relative. This mainly affects women and upholds a neoliberal view of older people. By only problematizing gender perspective on the challenges to gender equality in working life, a narrow understanding of gender equality is created which deviates from other national gender equality policies. The policy debate thereby contributes also to excluding older women and men from the Swedish gender equality project. Despite the argument that an extended working life is needed to ensure the value of pensions, this does not apply to those who are unable to continue working - they are instead expected to rely on the social security scheme.

Gender perspectives on extended working life policies

This chapter documents international policy developments and provides a gender critique of retirement, employment and pension policies in Australia, Ireland, Germany, Portugal, Sweden, the UK, and the US. It assesses the degree to which the individual country's extended working life policies have adopted the agenda (increasing pension age and introducing flexible working) set out by the OECD and the EU. Policies include raising state pension age, changes in the duration of pension contribution requirements, the move from defined benefits to defined contribution pensions, policies on caring for vulnerable members of the population, policies enabling flexible working and anti-age discrimination measures. An expanded framework is used to assess the degree to which gender and other intersecting issues such as health, caring, class, type of occupation and/or membership of minority communities have (or have not) been taken into account in designing and implementing policies extending working life.

Theoretical and conceptual issues in the extending working lives agenda

The policy debate on older people's extended participation in working life is not based on a social movement, such as the one putting forward demands on job opportunities for women, and has, by means of categorical stereotypes, mostly characterised older people as the problem. This narrative of individual choices and decisions presents older workers as de-gendered, de-classed individuals, shorn of their individual biographies and social contexts. It also treats the issue of extending working life as a phenomenon disconnected from surrounding society and trends. This line of reasoning points to the need for more sophisticated theoretical foundations. This chapter therefore provides a more encompassing framework for the discussion of extending working lives and outlines a new research agenda, including a power perspective with potential to shed light on age-based inequality, an intersectional perspective and a masculinity perspective which challenges the homogenous descriptions of older workers, a feminist understanding of work and a life course perspective which provides a framework which links the previous three.

Ageing and older workers in Portugal: a gender-sensitive approach

Adopting a gender-sensitive approach, the chapter is designed to provide a diagnosis of the ageing process in Portugal and discuss the main implication of policies aimed at retaining older workers in the labour market. It also seeks to observe the impact of labour and pension reforms, as well as of the extensive cuts in welfare provisions on their working and living conditions. Some of the key topics address the gendered patterns over the life course associated with employment, unpaid care work, vulnerability to income poverty and material deprivation. It is argued that comprehensive national strategy has never been fully developed in terms of measures to implement an extended working life.

The Australian empirical landscape of extended working lives: a gender perspective

This chapter analyses the empirical landscape of older women's working lives, which is shaped by connected structural disadvantages constituted by neoliberal institutions. It initially explains the recent Australian political discourse of 'intergenerational equity', which rationalises the government's policy of prolonging working lives until the revised pension age of 70 in 2035. Yet older women are cumulatively disadvantaged within a 'de-accumulation trajectory' over the life course by a trinity of pillars: comparatively lower wages then men, institutional arrangements of pensions and government supported superannuation. The data analysis shows that gender wage gaps cascaded to increased pension dependency and superannuation gender gaps. Globalisation supported gendered industry career trajectories, with the highest gender wage gaps found in male-dominated professional and financial sector industries, while older women were concentrated in low-waged service industries. Finally, women's lower participation within unemployment programs further limited their economic participation, undermining government policy directions of extending working lives.

The empirical landscape of extended working lives

Population-level factors associated with demographic ageing and policies intended to encourage older workers to extend working lives in Australia, Germany, Ireland, Portugal, Sweden, UK and US are documented in this chapter. Data are from international sources (mainly the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and the CIA Factbook, to ensure comparability) derived from government agencies in the seven countries covered in this volume. Presenting population-level data for each country gives readers a starting point for considering how each nation compares to the others analysed in the later country chapters. Data related to demographic ageing, including patterns in longevity, proportion of national populations aged 65+, and country-specific dependency ratios are presented first. These set the stage for understanding the potential gendered implications of demands for older workers to postpone retirement and extend their working lives. Additional comparative data provided in this chapter include nation-specific patterns of women's and men's labour force participation, gender pay and gender pension gaps, typical retirement ages, and a summary of older worker's recent experiences in the labour market. Patterns of unpaid care work, time use, and full-time versus part-time employment are also compared to provide a foundation against which readers can assess the prospects for older workers in general, and the particular disadvantages faced by older women in particular, when governments demand that individuals postpone retirement and work longer.

Is 70 the new 60? Extending American women’s and men’s working lives

Although the United States economy rebounded relatively quickly from the global recession, older workers wanting or needing to work longer confront similar limitations to those in other countries. The critical role of Social Security for shaping patterns of later life work is considered, alongside the US neoliberal stance that minimizes family-friendly policies that would support more equal gender outcomes for work and retirement. Instead, the structure of employment markets, persistent gender gaps in pay, raced and gendered outcomes related to sources and amounts of retirement income, and increasing retirement ages that compel some of the most vulnerable Americans to work longer are considered. The concept of extended working life is considered at both ends of the adult life course, taking into account the challenges of both young and older workers given the realities of the US labour market, underscoring the importance of taking both labour supply and demand into account to fully understand the implications of extended working lives. Although women bear a disproportionate burden of unpaid care, few compensatory policies exist to ensure their income adequacy in old age. That, combined with ageism in the American workplace, make older women who have interrupted work histories or lifetimes of low paid or part time work very vulnerable to experiencing precarious employment, or low incomes/poverty in old age.

Extended working lives in Germany from a gender and life-course perspective: a country in policy transition

Many policy areas of the German welfare state that are important for understanding the gendered implications of extended working lives have been reformed over the years-not only employment and pensions, but also child and long-term care. The country has been perceived as successful in especially turning a pronounced early retirement culture around. In this chapter a feminist political economy of ageing and life course perspective is applied, which shows a more differentiated picture, one that does not show a success story for all. Especially women and lower qualified person work part-time in later stages of their career or leave the labour market before state pension age, which is disadvantageous in social insurance countries, such as Germany. It is expected that old age incomes will become more polarised and old age poverty will grow.

The United Kingdom – a new moral imperative: live longer, work longer

The drift of government policy affecting older workers in the UK has been focused on encouraging individual responsibility for working longer and saving more, often with an idealised 'adult worker' in mind; an individual devoid of family context and family demands and accumulated advantages or disadvantages. As a result the policies have a differential impact on women and men and diverse incomes groups and are likely to lead to greater inequality between older workers. The focus on the individual (the supply side in the labour market) also takes emphasis away from the problem of demand: whether employers want to retain or recruit older workers. There is an increasingly strong moral assertion that to live longer should mean to work longer, but research demonstrates that those most likely to be unemployed before state pension age are out of work because of lack of job opportunities, poor health or caring responsibilities.