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Delaying Retirement pp 1–21Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

Retirement Transitions in Times of Institutional Change: Theoretical Concept

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Abstract

For more than three decades, many European and other affluent societies have been following a trend of fostering older workers’ exit from employment well before reaching formal retirement ages. Yet, faced with demographic aging, many countries have undergone a substantial change in their policies toward older workers, reflected in a shift to a policy explicitly fostering longer working careers and employment retention of older workers. This introductory chapter takes this institutional shift as a starting point for developing a novel theoretical framework that conceptualizes work and retirement transitions within this changing institutional landscape.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Examples of such alternative “welfare state subsystems” for early retirement are disability benefits and unemployment pay schemes (Guillemard 1991; Kohli et al. 1991).

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Duisburg-Essen, Duisburg, Germany

    Dirk Hofäcker

  2. Department of Social Sciences, Universidad Carlos III de, Madrid, Spain

    Jonas Radl

Authors
  1. Dirk Hofäcker
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  2. Jonas Radl
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Correspondence to Dirk Hofäcker .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Duisburg-Essen, Essen, Germany

    Dirk Hofäcker

  2. Institute of Gerontology at the Technical University of Dortmund, Dortmund, Germany

    Moritz Hess

  3. Department of Psychology, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden

    Stefanie König

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Hofäcker, D., Radl, J. (2016). Retirement Transitions in Times of Institutional Change: Theoretical Concept. In: Hofäcker, D., Hess, M., König, S. (eds) Delaying Retirement. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-56697-3_1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-56697-3_1

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-137-56696-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-137-56697-3

  • eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)

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