Ageing and Work in Europe

By Jean-Paul Peulet

Increased life expectancy and reduced fertility rates in Europe create a tension between social welfare systems and the labour market.

According to the Commission's European Employment Observatory (spring 2003), the 16-29 years age group will decline by 13 million people between 1995 and 2015 in the 15 Member States of the European Union (estimated for the EU before the enlargement to 25 Member States on 1 May 2004). At the same time, the number of 50-64 year olds will increase by 16 million.

This is a vital issue for the future. The EU has set the objective of raising the employment rate of older people. In March 2001, the European Council of Stockholm aimed at a rate of 50% employment for workers aged 55 to 64 by 2010. (It also sets the objective of reaching an employment rate in the EU of 70% for the whole population of working age, and of 60% for women.) The Barcelona European Council in March 2002 agreed on the target of gradually increasing the average retirement age by five years over the same period.

The joint report of the Council and Commission entitled 'Towards an increase in the participation in the labour market and promotion of active ageing' defines the guidelines encouraging Member States to promote policies aimed at abolishing early retirement schemes, setting up more flexible work organisation structures in terms of working hours, and developing access to lifelong learning.

This report examines the measures taken by the seven countries currently in the European Working Conditions Observatory to target these objectives. It identifies successful elements in terms of quality of work and employment. These elements are gathered from a cross-section of the information from the seven countries, whose experiences, social models and evolutions are representative of European diversity, and from data drawn from Eurostat, the employment survey in 2002, the European working conditions surveys and the OECD. Company case examples will illustrate these successes.