We’ve written before, for example here and here, about the rise of the “older” worker, and it’s no accident that one of our categories is called Work & Unretirement. But you may have thought it was not yet a big trend — interesting, worth keeping an eye on, but not yet statistically powerful. Surely the youngest generation, Gen Z, is the fastest growing age group in the workforce.
Think again.
As reported by human resources consultant Mercer, here, people over the age of 75 (no, that’s not a typo) “will constitute the fastest-growing age band in the civilian workforce between now and 2030.” In fact, according to a CNN story here, this age group has more than quadrupled in size since 1964, and it’s expected that the cohort of older working Americans Americans will double over the next 10 years.
The CNN article offers reasons that will already be familiar to SuperAging News readers: “People are living longer and more likely to be healthy into old age. The nature of work has also changed.”
The article quotes Gal Wettstein, a senior research economist at the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College: “More people are working at desk jobs that don’t require much physical labor. That contributes to people’s ability to work longer.” (That said, according to Monique Morrisey, a senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, about half of older workers still have physical demanding jobs.)
The CNN article presents several interesting individual stories, and the emphasis is definitely on the financial reasons to keep working: longevity plus inadequate retirement savings equals a need to keep working. While this is undoubtedly a big factor, the Mercer article notes other benefits that we have consistently reported, both in our book and on this website: “Working later in life can provide seniors with purpose and social connections, both essential to health and happiness.”
To enhance those possibilities, employers are becoming more aware of what they need to do to create a better work environment. After all, it’s to their advantage, as well as a considerable advantage to society: as the Mercer article notes, “People 50 and older contribute $8.3 trillion dollars to the economy.”
What should companies do? The Mercer article offers these ideas:
– Encourage cross-mentoring programs
– Adopt technology with an ageless design
_ Support workers who are experiencing hearing loss (this applies to about a third of people over 60)
– Offer caregiving benefits
– Avoid ageism
This last point is particularly important. According to an AARP study, media and marketing images of people aged 50 and older “are seven times more likely to be negative than images of those under the age of 50. Only 13% of the images show an older adult at work and only 4% show an older adult with coworkers. Typically, older people are shown alone or with a partner in the home. It’s worth reviewing the language and images you use not only externally for your products and services but internally among your employees as well.”
AARP also found that about two-thirds of adults over 50 “think that older workers face discrimination in the workplace. Nearly 90% of those workers think ageism is commonplace.”