In this paper we argue that mandatory retirement is only one aspect of a much broader system that influences an individual's retirement decision. We look at responses over time to variations in mandatory retirement rules faced by a sample of private-sector workers aged 62-64 in 1973. This is...

How have post-career transitions into and out of self-employment been impacted by the Great Recession? Research from the 1990s and 2000s has shown that the prevalence of self employment increases substantially later in life, partly because self employment provides older workers with...

In this paper, we compare the patterns of labor force withdrawal of older workers in seven OECD countries. We find wide variation in retirement patterns and recent trends. In Sweden and the United States, for example, it is relatively common for workers to combine retirement benefits and...

Analyzing data from the Retirement History Study, the authors find that the retirement plans of male workers aged 58-63 in 1969 were significantly affected by unanticipated events over the next decade. Specifically, unanticipated increases in Social Security wealth induced retirement earlier...

Wages in the public sector are often set on the basis of comparisons with compensation in the private sector. There are reasons to suspect that this approach may result in government pay schedules that exceed those in the private sector. In this paper, with a human capital model of wage...

This book summarizes research on individual retirement decisions and aggregate retirement trends. It also serves as an excellent reference source on the economics of retirement.