Does Retirement Kill You? Evidence from Early Retirement Windows

Norma Coe and Maarten Lindeboom ()

No 3817, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: The magnitude of the effect that health has on the retirement decision has long been studied. We examine the reverse relationship, whether or not retirement has a direct impact on later-life health. In order to identify the causal relationship, we use unexpected early retirement window offers to instrument for retirement behavior. They are legally required to be unrelated to the baseline health of the individual, and are significant predictors of retirement. We find that there is no negative effect of early retirement on men's health, and if anything, a temporary increase in self-reported health and improvements in health of highly educated workers. While this is consistent with previous literature using Social Security ages as instruments, we also find some evidence that anticipation of retirement might also be important, and might bias the previous estimates towards zero.

Keywords: health; retirement; instrument; causal effect (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I12 J08 J14 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 31 pages
Date: 2008-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-age, nep-hea and nep-lab
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (139)

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Working Paper: Does Retirement Kill You? Evidence from Early Retirement Windows (2008)
Working Paper: Does Retirement Kill You? Evidence from Early Retirement Windows (2008)
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