Lain - Reconstructing Retirement

First published in Great Britain in 2016 by

Policy Press University of Bristol 1-9 Old Park Hill Bristol BS2 8BB UK Tel +44 (0)117 954 5940 e-mail

North American office: Policy Press c/o The University of Chicago Press 1427 East 60th Street Chicago, IL 60637, USA t: +1 773 702 7700 f: +1 773-702-9756 e:

Policy Press 2016

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record for this book has been requested

ISBN 978 1 44732 617 5 hardcover
ISBN 978-1-4473-2624-3 ePub
ISBN 978-1-4473-2625-0 Mobi

The right of David Lain to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved: no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission of Policy Press.

The statements and opinions contained within this publication are solely those of the author and not of the University of Bristol or Policy Press. The University of Bristol and Policy Press disclaim responsibility for any injury to persons or property resulting from any material published in this publication.

Policy Press works to counter discrimination on grounds of gender, race, disability, age and sexuality.

Cover design by Andrew Corbett
Front cover image: istock
Readers Guide
This book has been optimised for PDA.
Tables may have been presented to accommodate this devices limitations.
Image presentation is limited by this devices limitations.

My interest in older workers and retirement issues began over a decade ago, when I was a Researcher at the Institute for Employment Studies. Working on a project evaluating the New Deal 50+ programme, I was travelling around the country interviewing (formerly) unemployed older people who had joined the scheme. What struck me at the time was how diverse their circumstances were, and yet they had all faced challenges finding new work after becoming unemployed. I began to wonder how older people would fare in future, as state pension ages began to rise and pressures to work in older age intensified. This book therefore examines prospects for employment beyond age 65 in the UK and US in the context of state pension age rises. It was funded by a three-year Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship (201114); I thank the Trust for providing me with this opportunity. The University of Brighton Business School was an excellent environment in which to conduct this research, and I thank my colleagues, the Dean of the School, Aidan Berry, and my excellent PhD students Dave Wright, Christine Lewis and Karen Hanley. Particular thanks go to my colleague, Jacqueline OReilly, who supervised my DPhil in Sociology when we were both at the University of Sussex. Jackie was an excellent DPhil supervisor, and is now a good friend and very supportive colleague.

Outside of my school, Sarah Vickerstaff, Wendy Loretto and Chris Phillipson deserve particular thanks for their support, guidance and friendship during the writing of this book. Sarah Vickerstaff was the external examiner for my DPhil, and made a particular effort to involve me in her research networks and projects afterwards. Sarah kindly read the manuscript of this book, and offered perceptive comments and suggestions about the concluding chapter. Wendy Loretto has also influenced the contents of this book, via work we have done together on the changing nature of employment at age 65-plus. Chris Phillipson has been supportive of my work in general, and kindly read an early draft of some of the analysis and gave me useful feedback. I worked with Sarah, Wendy and Chris on the ESRC Uncertain Futures project, and I thank other researchers on this project that have influenced my work: Charlotte Clark, Mariska van der Horst, Ben Baumberg, Brian Beach and Sue Shepherd. I would also like to acknowledge the help of Tony Lynes, someone I admired greatly for advancing the cause of earnings-related pensions in the UK. We met on a number of occasions and he very kindly gave me publications from his collection that were extremely useful in writing Chapter Two. Tony Lynes sadly passed away in 2014.

The ideas and analysis in this book have also been enhanced by my involvement with the ESRC Rethinking Retirement Seminar Series, which I co-organised with Sarah Vickerstaff and Wendy Loretto. Around 150 people attended the seminars between 2010 and 2012, and we were also able to collect together papers from the series on pension reforms (in Social Policy in Society ) and employment in older age (in Employee Relations ). This experience taught me a huge amount about work and retirement in older age, and I thank the participants, presenters and discussants. At the final seminar at the University of Kent I was able to present early findings from this book, and I thank my discussant, Lynne Robertson-Rose, and the audience for their extremely useful comments.

Given that this research concerns the UK and the US, I was grateful to the Leverhulme Foundation and University of Brighton for enabling me to travel to the US on research trips. I was a Visiting Scholar at the Aging Studies Institute, Syracuse University, in the summer of 2012. I discussed my research with a number of people at Syracuse, in particular Madonna Harrington Meyer, Chris Himes, Andrew London, Perry Singleton, Janet Wilmoth, and Douglas Wolf. I would particularly like to thank Madonna Harrington Meyer, who ensured that my trip was not only intellectually stimulating but also great fun. During this US trip in 2012, I also went to Boston, to present the early research findings at the Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics Conference at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. During this trip John B. Williamson kindly met up with me at Boston College, and was very generous with his time and ideas. I was also able to present my ongoing research at the Gerontological Society of America (GSA) conferences in New Orleans (2013), Washington (2014), and Florida (2015). I am a member of the Older Workers Interest Group of the GSA, and I would like to thank other group-members who have helped to enhance my understanding of the US situation.

In addition to US trips, I have been fortunate to gain a broader perspective by presenting my research to audiences in a number of European countries. Dominique Anxo kindly invited me to present at Linneaus University in Sweden in 2014; I would like to thank Dominique, Mirza Baig and Anna Herbert for making it an intellectually stimulating and enjoyable trip. I was also able to get policy-orientated perspectives by presenting my research to the European Economic and Social Committee of the European Parliament (in 2013); the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working conditions (2012); and Age Northern Ireland (2014). I thank these organisations for the invitations to present at these stimulating events. I was also fortunate enough to present the ongoing research in this book at the conferences of the European Network for Social Policy Analysis (ESPAnet) (2013), the Social Policy Association (2013), and the British Society of Gerontology (2015).