What Is the Average Retirement Age?

Alicia Munnell

Issues in Brief from Center for Retirement Research

Abstract: Since working longer is the key to a secure retirement for the vast majority of older Americans, it is useful to take a look at labor force trends for those under and over age 65 for the last century. This brief proceeds in three steps. The first section describes the long-run decline in labor force participa-tion of men. The second looks at the turnaround that began in the mid-1980s. The third section discusses the trends for women, which combine their increas-ing labor force activity, on the one hand, and incen-tives to retire, on the other. The final section concludes that labor force activity of both men and women has increased significantly since the mid-1980s as many incentives now en-courage work. Several hurdles remain to continued increases, however, including the sluggish economic recovery, the move away from career employment, the availability of Social Security at 62, and employer resistance to part-time employment.

Pages: 8 pages
Date: 2011-08, Revised 2011-08
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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