Workers unenthusiastic about 'Active Ageing'

"Legislation [on anti-age discrimination] is necessary, but not sufficient basis for encouraging active ageing. We need to look at working conditions, flexibility of working hours and give older people incentives, not only financial, to keep them in employment. In the end, it is about individual choices as we cannot force people to work," said Dr Elizabeth Mestheneous, vice-president of the European Older People's Platform (AGE).

Mirko Sporket, researcher at the Institute of Gerontology (Germany), presented examples of good practice with regards policies in favour of participation in employment and the productivity of the ageing workforce. Good practice consists of "measures that combat age barriers and promote age diversity", he said listing actions and policies concerning career development, re-employment, employment exit and transition to pension as examples. 

According to Sporket, several case studies sho that companies' measures to encourage active ageing have proven successful. "Overall, the different measures have led to benefits for employees in terms of stabilisation of their work situation and increase of employability and to employers in terms of increase in productivity and competitiveness. Thanks to the measures taken, the companies have even observed enhanced innovation capacity," said Sporket, adding that companies do have a business case to retain knowledge. In addition, "ageing has become a corporate culture and a social responsibility issue".

For business positions  on ageing, see EurActiv.com's article on the discussion held during the European Business Summit in March 2007.

"The key policy challenge with ageing is to keep the support ratio [number of people of working age per person over age of 65] bearable by increasing the number of supporters," said Professor John Philpott, chief economist at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD). "With regards the recently introduced anti-age discrimination legislation [in the UK], it has not shown any significant observable impact as yet," he added.

"Increasing fertility rates, immigration, lifetime savings or state pension age can eventually help to remedy the situation but there is always a but in there: short-run effect on young age dependency ratio, immigrants age too, saving more could hinder economic growth and higher pension age won't solve the low activity problem," listed Philpott. "Therefore, increasing activity rates could help, as long as employer and social reluctance is overcome and the positive case for active ageing made for both employers and employees," added Philpott. 

"People are living healthier and longer lives, and the question is what they can do for 20 years after retirement. We need to empower people to invent new models to organise their lives differently and find the right life balance," said Harry Gray, director of the NW Emeritus College. 

The European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound) lists a number measures for strategies for an ageing population: governments should develop active labour market policies to aid the integration of older workers by, for example, providing easy access to lifelong learning and through the improvement of labour market services; age-awareness training should be introduced for human-resource personnel, managers and other key staff; measures such as flexible hours and career leave should be extended; older workers themselves should be involved in discussions about age barriers and how to overcome them; trade unions should include in collective agreements recruitment and training measures; greater sharing of knowledge and expertise on the relationship between age and employment and the implementation of good practice should be encouraged. 

The foundation's website hosts a number of case studies on employment initiatives for an ageing workforce in Europe.

For the World Health Organization (WHO) active ageing is "the process of optimising opportunities for health, participation and security in order to enhance quality of life as people age. If ageing is to be a positive experience, longer life must be accompanied by continuing opportunities for health, participation and security," argues the WHO.