OLDER WORKERS

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SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH NETWORK

EMPLOYEE BENEFITS, COMPENSATION & PENSION LAW ABSTRACTS
Sponsored by Pension Governance, LLC
Vol. 8, No. 19: May 24, 2007

Editor: PAMELA J. PERUN
Policy Director, Initiative on Financial Security,
Aspen Institute
PAMELA@PLANETNOW.COM
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Topic of This Issue:
Older Workers
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T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S

"'Voluntary' and 'Involuntary' Early Retirement: An International
Analysis"
DAVID DORN
University of St. Gallen - Research Institute for Labour
Economics and Labour Law
ALFONSO SOUSA-POZA
University of St. Gallen - Department of Economics,
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)

"Aging, Labor Turnover and Firm Performance"
PEKKA ILMAKUNNAS
Helsinki School of Economics
MIKA MALIRANTA
ETLA, The Research Institute of the Finnish Economy

"Pension Reform and Labor Market Incentives"
WALTER H. FISHER
Institute for Advanced Studies (IHS) - Department of
Economics & Finance
CHRISTIAN KEUSCHNIGG
University of St. Gallen - Department of Economics
(IFF-HSG), CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo
Institute for Economic Research), Centre for Economic
Policy Research (CEPR)

"Recruitment and Job Applications of Older Jobseekers from the
Establishments' Perspective"
LUTZ BELLMANN
Institute for Employment Research (IAB), Institute for
the Study of Labor (IZA)
MARTIN BRUSSIG
Institut Arbeit und Qualifikation (IAQ)

"Employee Tenure, 2006"
CRAIG COPELAND
Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI)
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"'Voluntary' and 'Involuntary' Early Retirement: An International
Analysis"
IZA Discussion Paper No. 2714

Author: DAVID DORN
University of St. Gallen - Research Institute for
Labour Economics and Labour Law
Email: David.Dorn@unisg.ch
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=349740

Contact: ALFONSO SOUSA-POZA
University of St. Gallen - Department of Economics,
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)
Email: alfonso.sousa-poza@unisg.ch
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=333216

Full Text: http://ssrn.com/abstract=981700

ABSTRACT: Recent literature makes a distinction between
"voluntary" and "involuntary" early retirement, where
"involuntary" early retirement results from employment
constraints rather than from a preference for leisure relative to
work. This paper analyzes "voluntary" and "involuntary" early
retirement based on international microdata covering 19
industrialized countries. The results show that "involuntary"
early retirement is particularly widespread in Continental
Europe. Countries facing economic recessions and having strict
employment protection legislation have higher shares of
"involuntary" retirements among early retirees. Generous early
retirement provisions of the social security system do not only
make "voluntary" early retirement more attractive for
individuals, but also induce firms to push more employees into
early retirement.
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"Aging, Labor Turnover and Firm Performance"
ETLA Discussion Paper No. 1092

Author: PEKKA ILMAKUNNAS
Helsinki School of Economics
Email: pekka.ilmakunnas@hse.fi
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=434811

Contact: MIKA MALIRANTA
ETLA, The Research Institute of the Finnish Economy
Email: mika.maliranta@etla.fi
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=350200

Full Text: http://ssrn.com/abstract=984683

ABSTRACT: We study whether older workers are costly to firms. Our
estimation equations are derived from a variant of the
decomposition methods frequently used for measuring micro-level
sources of industry productivity growth. By using comprehensive
linked employeremployee data from the Finnish business sector, we
study the productivity and wage effects, and hence the
profitability effects, of hiring and separation of younger and
older workers. The evidence shows that separations of older
workers are profitable to firms, especially in the manufacturing
ICT-industries. Robustness checks include the use of regional
labor supply and other variables as instruments for the potential
endogeneity of the labor flows.
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"Pension Reform and Labor Market Incentives"
University of St. Gallen Economics Discussion Paper No.
2007-13

Author: WALTER H. FISHER
Institute for Advanced Studies (IHS) - Department
of Economics & Finance
Email: FISHER@IHS.AC.AT
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=238194

Contact: CHRISTIAN KEUSCHNIGG
University of St. Gallen - Department of Economics
(IFF-HSG), CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and
Ifo Institute for Economic Research), Centre for
Economic Policy Research (CEPR)
Email: christian.keuschnigg@unisg.ch
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=48350

Full Text: http://ssrn.com/abstract=984168

ABSTRACT: This paper investigates how parametric reform in a
pay-as-you-go pension system with a tax benefit link affects
retirement incentives and work incentives of prime-age workers.
We find that postponed retirement tends to harm incentives of
prime-age workers in the presence of a tax benefit link, thereby
creating a policy trade-off in stimulating aggregate labor
supply. We show how several popular reform scenarios are geared
either towards young or old workers, or, indeed, both groups
under appropriate conditions. We also provide a sharp
characterization of the excess burden of pension insurance and
show how it depends on the behavioral supply elasticities on the
extensive and intensive margins and the effective tax rates
implicit in contribution rates.
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"Recruitment and Job Applications of Older Jobseekers from the
Establishments' Perspective"
IZA Discussion Paper No. 2721

Contact: LUTZ BELLMANN
Institute for Employment Research (IAB), Institute
for the Study of Labor (IZA)
Email: lutz.bellmann@iab.de
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=227768

Co-Author: MARTIN BRUSSIG
Institut Arbeit und Qualifikation (IAQ)
Email: martin.brussig@uni-due.de
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=799620

Full Text: http://ssrn.com/abstract=982107

ABSTRACT: In the demographic change, a prolongation of individual
employment and thus of beginning a new employment in later stages
of the work life is of growing importance. On the base of
microeconomic data (establishment panel of the IAB), this paper
analyses firms' characteristics correlating with their
recruitment behaviour towards the elderly (age 50 and more).
Special consideration is given to the labour supply, which is
here observed as the existence of an application from job seekers
of age 50 and more, and which is a condition for recruiting of
older employees. The results show that about 75% of the firms did
not have an application of older job seekers. Of the remaining
firms, which reported to have applications from older job
seekers, about half of the firms recruited older job seekers, and
the other half did not so. However, there are remarkable
differences between firms which received applications from older
job seekers and firms which are willing to recruit older job
candidates. Possible explanations point to the search behaviour
of job seekers as well as to the signalling of firms on the
labour market towards the elderly.
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"Employee Tenure, 2006"
EBRI Notes, Vol. 28, No. 4, April 2007

Contact: CRAIG COPELAND
Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI)
Email: COPELAND@EBRI.ORG
Auth-Page: http://ssrn.com/author=255137

Full Text: http://ssrn.com/abstract=981014

ABSTRACT: This paper updates previous Employee Benefit Research
Institute (EBRI) publications that have examined employee tenure
data of American workers. The latest data on employee tenure from
the January 2006 Supplement to the U.S. Census Bureau's Current
Population Survey (CPS) are examined and compared with the trends
from previous CPS publications on employee tenure. A key finding
from the study shows that for all wage and salary workers in both
the private and public sectors age 25 or older, median job tenure
was virtually unchanged from 1983 (5.0 years) to 2006 (4.9
years).