That hasn’t happened so far. Instead, given the harsh financial retirement realities, Baby Boomers are holding on to their jobs. But employers don’t want to hang on to them.

From Older Staffers Get Uneasy Embrace:

Americans are, in fact, working longer, reversing a long trend toward earlier retirement.

The nation’s typical worker now retires at age 62, up from 60 a decade ago, according to the Employee Benefit Research Institute. About 60% of men between 60 and 64 are in the labor force, and 20% of men over 65, up from 55% and 17%, respectively, a decade ago, says the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The pattern is similar for women.

This is a significant change in a short period of time. In the past, health was a large cause in forcing retirement. So, too, was physical capacity to do the work. A larger service workforce lessen these causes.

Yet, finances play a large role in staying on. Baby Boomers never did as much saving for retirement as they should have as a group. That comes back to bite you. If you are healthy enough to work into your sixties, a few more years makes a big difference:

The Boston College scholars say delaying retirement three or four years — to 66, instead of 62, say — will boost retirement income by a third.

Assuming you save the money, of course.

From a career management perspective, doing the employment dance after age fifty becomes problematic – employers don’t want to hire you and don’t want to keep you:

While employers are “reasonably comfortable” with the older workers they currently employ, “they are not keen on retaining even half who want to stay on to age 67 or 69,” the Boston researchers concluded. They predict “a messy and uncomfortable mismatch with large numbers of older workers wanting to stay on while employers prefer that they do not.”

Why? Employers fear older workers “cost too much, lack current skills and don’t stick around long,” Ms. Munnell and co-author Steven Sass write. Wages tend to rise with seniority. Health costs for older workers are higher. Older workers are viewed, rightly or not, as less supple in dealing with new technologies.

That, my Boomer friends, is what you are fighting in the interviews for new jobs. Cost too much salary, no current skills, and higher benefit costs.

You can only fight these issues by proving your part in the formula “job skills + performance = opportunity.”

Going into interviews, or even setting up personal brands, it is important that you have the job and technology skills needed for the position. You also need to show clearly your performance in the work. Experience needs to count for something and performance is where that is done.

I would also add that you should display a continuing willingness to learn – especially technology. Gone are the days ignoring technology skills; too many products and processes require understanding the underlying integrated technology.

Anything that suggests that you are set in your ways (even if you are 25…) and are not willing to learn will give you a prompt “no” for the position. A person over 50, I believe, has a stereotype of unwilling to learn whereas a younger person has a stereotype of being able and willing to learn. Neither is true, of course, but that is the setup when looking for a position. Experience needs to have “willing to learn displayed by behavior” in the interview to fight the stereotype.

Only by demonstrating your current skills, job performance and willingness to learn can you overcome the inherent higher costs that come with experience to stay in the workforce.

Scot

Related posts:

1. Attention Gen Y: Baby Boomers are moving out

I always thought that position was a little overblown; what I observe in the marketplace is a lot of people who are forced to retire — and are not ready for it. But I didn’t really have some good stats to at least talk to a different viewpoint. After all, my lucid observations not backed by some facts doesn’t cut it…

In the September 24th issue of Newsweek, Jane Bryant Quinn has a few salient facts about the current retirement situation:

• Of those age 60 to 65, “a mere 33% still work at their primary jobs full time, according to the Employee Benefit Research Institute.”
• McKinsey & Co. notes “40% of retirees are forced to leave work earlier than they planned, ready or not.”
• And my favorite: The average retirement age is currently 57.

As usual, some of these baby boomers have financially planned better than others. But many baby boomers of today have been forced to retire early because of health issues or layoffs and not finding a different job in the same salary range as their old one. Often, the very baby boomers that need to continue working because they are not “retirement ready” from a financial perspective won’t be able to make up the difference needed for a secure retirement.

You will casually note that if you retire at age 57, you are not covered by Medicare until you are 65. Health insurance at that age is problematical as well.

My advice to Gen Y: start maxing out those 401(k) programs or the equivalent for all you entrepreneurs out there. Those baby boomers are moving out. And you don’t have as much time as you might think to get to “retirement ready.”

Scot

Related posts:

1. Baby Boomer interview tips
2. Senior Leaders have Short Attention Spans