retirement age ( age of eligibility ) contributes to designing labor market norms in that it works as a signal to both workers and employers, and affects the actual retirement age, thereby contributing to their preparations for continued employment. as we can see from labor force survey data, there has been a dramatic change in the labor market, which is reflected in a doubling of the rate of working women aged 60 – 64 from 25 percent in 2004 to 49 percent in 2013. increasing the retirement age requires complementary policy tools in the labor market in order to make the process of raising the retirement age for women successful, complementary policy tools must be used in the labor market, such as : • extending the period of unemployment benefits for older workers. • incentives for employing older women. • enforcing labor laws, particularly the prohibition against discrimination based on age. • allocating resources for professional training while focusing on more demanding professions. in summation, increasing the retirement age is expected to significantly increase the employment rate of older women, and the retirement age should be increased in order to ensure sufficient pension savings and income upon retirement. this should be accompanied by complementary measures such as encouraging the employment of older women, for example through programs such as “ experience required ”, which was launched by the ministry of seniors affairs this morning. there are obviously cases where older people have difficulty finding work, but the data show that the unemployment rate or those who despair of finding a job did not increase as a result of raising the retirement age. in view of all this, the more we promote raising the retirement age, it will be possible to do so more gradually, which will allow employers and workers to adjust and prepare for the change ahead of time, and to ensure proper employment until retirement and proper pensions for afterwards. bis central bankers ’ speeches

news conference zurich, 17 december 2020 andrea m. maechler introductory remarks by andrea m. maechler i will touch on two areas in my remarks today : first, i will review developments on the financial markets over the last half - year ; here i will comment briefly on our foreign exchange market interventions in 2020. then i will speak about the imminent changeover from swiss franc libor to saron. situation on the financial markets investor risk sentiment has been extremely volatile since our last news conference in june, mainly due to developments surrounding the coronavirus pandemic. over the summer months, economic activity and investor sentiment recovered following the relaxation of the containment measures introduced during the first wave of infections. in the autumn, the second wave of infections dampened investor confidence again, especially in europe. then, in november, news that coronavirus vaccines might soon become available caused market sentiment to return to a positive footing. in addition, various political risks, such as the brexit negotiations and the us presidential elections, influenced risk sentiment. monetary and fiscal policy on both sides of the atlantic also played an important role in market developments. having taken extensive measures to stabilise the markets in the wake of the turbulence in march, the us federal reserve ( fed ) and the european central bank ( ecb ) have since confirmed the expansionary stance of their respective monetary policies. the ecb recently eased its monetary policy further by, among other things, increasing the size of its bond - buying programme. moreover, market participants interpreted the fed ’ s revision of its monetary policy strategy as an indication that the fed will continue pursuing an expansionary monetary policy for an extended period. this, along with expectations of a major fiscal stimulus package, supported investor risk sentiment and caused inflation expectations in the us to rise. what is more, in europe, the agreement reached in july on the creation of an eu recovery fund led to a further decline in risk premia on sovereign bonds. page 1 / 5 zurich, 17 december 2020 andrea m. maechler news conference overall, risk markets were able to benefit for considerable periods of time, despite the volatile market environment. there was some divergence between the us and europe, however : while the leading us equity index, the s & p500, hit a new record high as early as the beginning of september driven by technology stocks, price developments on the major european stock markets were more moderate. thanks to the rally in november, all major indices are up on mid -