Older Workers: Research Readings
Author: Griffin, Tabatha, Ed.
Date: 2011-00-00
Type: Collected Works - General
Subjects: Employment Services,Employment Potential,Maturity (Individuals),Age Discrimination,Labor Market,Lifelong Learning,Educational Change,Essays,Trend Analysis,Performance Factors,Barriers,Employment Opportunities,Reentry Workers,Job Skills,Aging (Individuals),Labor Force Development,Older Workers,Postsecondary Education,Job Training,Job Development,Human Capital,Vocational Rehabilitation,Labor Needs,Labor Supply,Outreach Programs,Strategic Planning,Research Reports,Foreign Countries

One of the challenges facing Australia is the ageing of the population. Of major concern, especially to government, is that the dependency ratio--a measure of the burden that economically active persons carry by supporting dependent persons--will increase significantly unless older people keep working or immigration is used to change the demographic profile of the population. In the latest intergenerational report, the Australian Government identifies a number of education, employment service, and income support initiatives designed to increase participation of older workers. The Consultative Forum on Mature Age Participation, launched as part of the Productive Ageing Package in 2010, will assist in identifying opportunities for the government to further support employment for mature-aged workers. To help inform the consultative forum, and to generate discussion on older workers more broadly, the National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER) commissioned six researchers to draft essays on various issues around keeping older Australians engaged. Topic areas the authors touched on included: international trends in &quot;active ageing&quot;; age discrimination; determinants of labour force participation; the economics of population ageing and the effects of superannuation reform; the nature of workforce participation and under-participation; and employability and training. Discussants were invited to present and respond to these essays at a policy roundtable held in May 2011. The essays and the discussants' responses are contained in this volume, which also includes an introduction that distils the major themes. The major themes were: (1) the need to recognise the diversity of older workers; (2) the challenge of low literacy and numeracy skills for some groups of older workers; (3) issues around discrimination and stereotypes; (4) lifelong learning as a core concept in modern careers, aligned with the notion of active ageing; and (5) that it should not be assumed that all older workers want to keep working. This publication contains: (1) Introduction (Georgina Atkinson and Francesca Beddie); (2) Making the Most of Mature Minds: Issues, Trends and Challenges in Making Active Ageing a Reality (Jasper van Loo); Discussant (Elizabeth Brooke); (3) Employment at Older Ages in Australia: Determinants and Trends (Peter McDonald); Discussant (Graeme Hugo); (4) Ageism and Age Discrimination in the Labour Market and Employer Responses (Philip Taylor); Discussant (Michael Keating); (5) Economics of Population Ageing: Australia May Not Have a Labour Supply Problem, but Recent Superannuation Reforms Have Not Helped (Bruce Headey); Discussant (Saul Eslake); (6) Understanding Mature-Age Workforce Participation in Australia (Helen Kimberley and Dina Bowman); Discussant (Michelle Hogan); and (7) Older Workers, Employability and Tertiary Education and Training (Stephen Billett); Discussant (Hugh Guthrie). Individual papers contain tables, figures, footnotes and references.