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Bye-bye to career employment for Baby Boomer men
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Single-job careers are going the way of vinyl records -- they're still around, but not in the numbers they once were, according to the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College.
At one time, there was the notion that you could work for one employer for your entire professional career. But today, only 46 percent of older male workers are still with their age-50 employer, down from 70 percent in the early 1980s, according to the center's latest brief entitled "The Decline of Career Employment."
The researchers, who concentrated their efforts on men, also found:
-- This drop in career employment means that more older workers face the challenge of finding a new job;
-- These new jobs generally pay less and offer fewer benefits, but also are less stressful and more satisfying;
-- Eventually job changing could encourage longer worklives by better matching employer and worker needs, but in the short term it is an impediment.
The center says a variety of economic and social factors will contribute to men working longer, but not necessarily for the same employer.
"Career employment – meaning employment with a single employer from middle age to retirement – is no longer the norm. So if workers are to remain in the labor force into their late 60s, most will face the difficult task of finding a new job in their 50s and 60s," it said.
Longer life and shifts in the economic climate are among the contributing factors cited for the need for men to work into their 60s and possibly beyond.
The center notes that the newer jobs that older men find may pay less than a previous job, thus extending the need to work beyond the age of retirement, increasing from the average current retirement age of 63 to an estimated age of 67.
