Employment Potential Index of Older People in the European Union

Abstract

The aging of the population in Europe brings an increase in the group of people 65+, which is important to reflect on not only from the perspective of state governance in developing strategies and finding solutions to aging-related phenomena such as the growing economic dependence of older people, but it is also necessary to pay attention to this in terms of the theory and practice of human resources and age management within using the employment potential of older people in the labor market. The article focuses on the employment potential index of older people (EPIOP) and on the characterization of the factors which were used to create EPIOP and subsequently to monitor its development in the European Union (EU 28) during the years 2008-2018. The data were obtained from Eurostat and UNECE databases. The findings indicate that the indices of the individual countries had a predominantly increasing trend and converged with the EU 28 average, and none of the countries monitored in the index fell below the base year 2008 throughout the period under review. Latvia (23%), Bulgaria (23%) and Cyprus (19%) had significantly higher growth rates compared to the base year. The lowest EPIOP grew in Germany, the Netherlands, France, Denmark, Slovenia and the Czech Republic. The EU 28 average had a maximum growth rate of 9%.