Improving Opportunities for Older Workers

Abstract

AbstractThe authors have explained the advantage of working longer—for those who can—as pensions disappear and life expectancy rises. One proposal to increase the employment of older workers is to automatically move retirement-age workers onto Medicare, thereby eliminating employer costs of providing them with health insurance and making them less expensive to employ. Policymakers could incentivize low-wage older workers to keep working by enhancing the Earned Income Tax Credit, a wage subsidy that is currently unavailable to older workers. Another important way to increase older worker employment is by strengthening anti-discrimination laws. In principle, age-related discrimination in the workplace is prohibited. But judges interpret the law in ways that largely vitiate it, creating the need for legal reform. This chapter examines proposals to encourage workers to stay on the job and give them greater work opportunities.