Predicting End‐of‐Career Transitions for Baby Boomers Nearing Retirement Age

Abstract

Retirement has traditionally been conceptualized as a point-in-time decision to physically and psychologically withdraw from the workforce on reaching a certain age. However, the expectations of older workers demonstrate a new retirement paradigm, with many more retirement trajectories. The purpose of this study was to examine actual career decisions being made by older workers and to understand sociodemographic factors that might differentiate their career trajectories. Data from the Health and Retirement Study (Juster & Suzman, 1995) were analyzed using multinomial logistic regression to compare 4 retirement trajectories (i.e., no retirement, full retirement, bridge employment, and encore career). Gender, age, education, marital status, health, and wealth differentially predicted the odds of pursuing each of the 4 retirement decisions. Career practitioners may use these results to help baby boomers make retirement decisions and provide them with appropriate education, guidance, and resources. Additional research is needed to examine other factors salient to each of the retirement trajectories.

Contemplating the Antecedents of a Sustainable Work Life in an Emerging Economy: Lessons from Early Retirees in the ICT Sector of Pakistan

“…These career transitions could be unplanned in the form of involuntary job exits imposed by organizational restructuring or downsizing, or pre-planned, taking the shape of job hopping from one organization to another. Retirement itself is regarded as a form of work transition which may be followed by part-time employment in the form of bridge employment [11].…”

“…Career development research has witnessed various kinds of bridge employment opportunities depending on the choice of industry, skillset and work experience of the retirees. A bridge employment opportunity would typically be some kind of seasonal, time-bound work, which may or may not be in the same industry in which the retirees previously worked [11], and this opportunity could also develop into a sustainable long-term work assignment if the worker's skillset and the employer's requirements are aligned.…”

“…This scholarship of sustainable career development and post-retirement career trajectories has recently started to emerge for developed countries, with researchers exploring this avenue from the perspective of those elderly who pursued various career trajectories after retirement [11,12]; yet, another stream of literature has also examined the viability of entrepreneurial career opportunities as the intended choice of those mid-career individuals who suffered a job loss [13,14]. However, very little is known about the nature and antecedents of post-retirement career trajectories within a developing country such as Pakistan, which is also facing the challenge of the aging population phenomenon [4].…”

Berufliche Beratung Älterer

“…Moreover, identification of the continuers type of retiree may guide the planning intervention in the conception of retirement as a late-career development stage (Wang & Shi, 2014) and focus on late-career decision-making. Concretely, they may consider different career options such as delaying one's retirement (i.e., non-retirement), choosing a bridge employment (i.e., a short-to middle-term job assignment aiming at making a bridge between full employment and full retirement) or an encore career (i.e., reengagement in education in order to reorient oneself for a more purposeful career) (Boveda & Metz, 2016).…”

Biografie – Lebenslauf – Generation : Perspektiven der Erwachsenenbildung

“…das Risiko von Altersarmut aufgrund sinkender staatlich abgesicherter Rentenansprüche zu reduzieren (vgl. Bredt 2008;Boemen et al 2016;Boveda/ Metz 2016).…”