The effects of prolonged working life on subjective quality of life across Europe

Does work after retirement affect health-related quality of life: Evidence from a propensity score matching study in China

AIM

Extending working life is considered as an important initiative to respond to the population aging and pension payment dilemma. This study aimed to investigate whether work after retirement is related to improved health-related quality of life.

METHODS

We used two waves of data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study in 2011 and 2018. Work after retirement was ascertained based on self-reported retirement and work status, and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) was measured with the three-level EuroQol five-dimensions. The impact of work after retirement on HRQOL was analyzed using the propensity score matching with difference-in-difference approach.

RESULTS

A total of 1043 retirees were included. The results showed that work after retirement was associated with significant improvement in HRQOL among retirees (β = 0.072, P < 0.001). Heterogeneity analyses did not show specificity on sex (P for sex interaction >0.05), but older-aged retirees seemed more sensitive to the benefits of work after retirement on HRQOL than their younger-aged counterparts (≥65 years: β = 0.167, P < 0.001 vs <65 years: β = -0.047, P > 0.05; P for age interaction = 0.010).

CONCLUSIONS

Work after retirement shows a positive impact on HRQOL among community-dwelling adults in China. Policy-makers should take the health of retirees into account when implementing policies related to delayed retirement, and reduce health inequity. Geriatr Gerontol Int 2024; 24: 722-729.

Effects of digital skills and other individual factors on retirement decision-making and their gender differences

Increasing the pension age as a dominant solution to population ageing does not bring desirable outcomes, if not accompanied by other essential measures in lifelong learning and fighting age discrimination. Moreover, rapid digitalisation and automation in the labour market bring additional uncertainties for the growing group of older workers. The analysis is based on the SHARE data from Waves 5, 6, and 7 and examines predictors of retirement intentions by two different estimation methods. While digital skills are positively associated with a willingness to stay in the labour market in the random-effect modelling, fixed-effects regression shows no correlation between digital skills and retirement intentions. This difference means that digital skills do not correlate with retirement intentions once we control for time-invariant individual characteristics. Thus, increasing ICT literacy among older workers can have a very limited potential for extending working lives. In contrast to this result, starting to be self-employed, health improvement, having an additional grandchild, and losing a partner increase the willingness to work longer. The study identifies the factors shaping retirement intentions, which should be reflected in any effective social policy.

Size or Content of the Pie? Source of Income and Perceived Income Adequacy of Older Europeans

While public pensions are usually the main source of income in old age, other sources of income may have various consequences for pensioners' economic well-being across households and countries. In this study, we analyze how perceived income adequacy of older Europeans is shaped by the source and the income level. We hypothesize that the source of income can be related to a household's perceived income adequacy beyond the money it provides. We distinguish four categories of income sources: (old age) pensions, other social benefits, work, and capital. We show that the source of income is related to perceived adequacy beyond the money it provides. Compared with pensions, income from other social benefits or work is associated with lower, and income from capital with higher perceptions of adequacy. Perceived adequacy of income from different sources varied further across the household income level. The results convey important messages to the policy makers. Pensions are a powerful policy tool, as they provide positive externalities beyond their monetary value. Attention should also be paid to the low-income households' possibilities to save.

The effect of roles prescribed by active ageing on quality of life across European regions

The active ageing approach supports a set of roles or activities that are supposed to be beneficial for older adults. This paper reassesses the benefits of activities for the quality of life by (a) analysing many activities at the same time to control each other, (b) using panel data to detect the effects of activities over time, and (c) performing separate analyses for four European regions to test the context-specificity of the effects. The effects of roles in later life are tested on panel data from three waves of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) project. The results of fixed-effects regression show that only some activities – volunteering, participating in a club and physical activity – increase the quality of life, and that care-giving within the household has the opposite effect. Moreover, the beneficial effects are much weaker and less stable than the other types of regression suggest; they are beneficial only in some regions, and their effect is much weaker than the effects of age, health and economic situation. Therefore, the active ageing approach and activity theory should reflect the diverse conditions and needs of older adults to formulate more-context-sensitive and less-normative policy recommendations.