Posts Tagged “jobs for over 50’s”

One-third of Australian pensioners live in poverty: OECD report

One-third of Australian pensioners live in poverty, according to a report by the OECD, Photo: Greg Newington

More than one-third of Australian pensioners are living below the poverty line, making the country among the worst performers in the world for the financial security of older people.

The findings of the OECD report, Pensions at a Glance 2015, compared Australia to 33 other countries.

Australia was ranked second lowest on social equity, with 36 per cent of pensioners living below the poverty line, which the report defined as half the relevant country’s median household income.

Australian pensioners fared better than their counterparts in South Korea, where 50 per cent live below the poverty line but performed poorly against the OECD average of 12.6 per cent.

The report, released last month, found the Australian government contributes less to old-age benefits than other OECD countries. The Australian government spends 3.5 per cent of GDP on the pension, below the OECD average of 7.9 per cent.

The findings are backed up by the Global Age Watch Index 2015 report card which rates countries by how well their older populations are faring.

It ranked Australia lowest in its region on income security, due to the high rate of old age poverty and pension coverage which is below the regional average.

Paul Versteege​, senior research and advocacy adviser with the Combined Pensioner and Superannuants Association, said the base Australian pension rate was low compared to median household incomes.

“There are huge discrepancies among retirees in various countries,” he said.

“In Australia there is quite a large group that has to subsist on the age pension as its only source of income. In spite of pension reform and recent increases to the pension, the base pension is still quite low for singles.”

The annual payment for a single person is about $22,000 and $34,000 for a couple, with 2.25 million Australians claiming the pension.

Council on the Ageing chief executive Ian Yates said the report challenged perceptions that the entitlement was too high.

“Claims that the age pension is somehow too extravagant and unsustainable do not bear out,” he said.

“We have always argued for progressive improvements to the pension but at the moment an increase to the pension is highly unlikely and more focus ought to go towards building superannuation contributions.”

Chief executive of Vision Super Stephen Rowe said he was “staggered” by the findings of the OECD report, saying it painted a bleak picture for many older Australians.

“Are we generous enough with the pension? I don’t think so.”

He said that Australians retiring now have not received the full benefit of compulsory superannuation contributions, introduced in 1992, but were grappling with rising living costs.

“The basic cost of living in Australia is quite high, compared with  some other OECD countries,” Mr Rowe said.

Chief executive of National Seniors Michael O’Neill said the pension had gone backwards in real terms and many older people had not accumulated enough superannuation to supplement the benefit.

“In terms of sustainability, the report confirms that Australia spends substantially less than the OECD average on pensions,” he said.

“In fact, our pension spend has dropped and plateaued since 2000. Against other countries, our proportion of pensioners living below the poverty line is startling.”

Source: TheAge

Retirement living standards aren’t so bad. You don’t need much super

The closer we get to taxing superannuation properly the more we are going to hear about how important it is and how much we are going need to live on in retirement. Don’t believe it. It’s almost all propaganda, almost all paid for with money taken out of our superannuation accounts.

The latest scary figure, produced by the Association of Superannuation Funds, is $58,784 per year. That’s how much it says a 65-year-old couple needs to live on in order to enjoy a “comfortable” retirement.

At the risk of stating the obvious, after tax and rent or mortgage payments most working Australians couldn’t afford such comfort.

It’s absurdly high. The fine print shows such a couple would spend $40 a week on alcohol, $80 a week on dining out, almost $200 a week on food and groceries, $136 a month on the phone and internet, $4000 a year on holidays within Australia, and $14,000 every five years on a holiday abroad.

The Association of Superannuation Funds estimate of how much a 65-year-old couple need to live is absurdly high. Illustration: John ShakespeareThe Association of Superannuation Funds estimate of how much a 65-year-old couple need to live is absurdly high. Illustration: John Shakespeare Photo: Illo:Shakespeare

Plus this: the best part of $250 a month on new clothes and shoes, $80 a month on hairdressing, $54 a month on pest control and/or an alarm service, and $350 a month on private health insurance.

At the risk of stating the obvious, after tax and rent or mortgage payments most working Australians couldn’t afford such comfort. How did such a figure come to be defined as the gold standard used to justify steady increases in compulsory super contributions and to attack plans to tax them properly?

Part of the answer is that the super industry really doesn’t care about the living standards of Australians who are working or about the extra tax they have to pay because super funds aren’t. Its chief concern is the $2 trillion in funds it has amassed to date, and the tens of billions of dollars of it that stick to its fingers each year in management fees.

Its so-called “comfortable” retirement standard was originally called “comfortably affluent but sustainable”. That’s right, the word “affluent” got edited out along the way. The University of NSW team that built it never intended it to apply to the bulk of retirees. For them they created a second standard, “one which affords full opportunity to participate in contemporary Australian society and the basic options it offers”. They labelled it “modest but adequate“.

The word “adequate” has also disappeared along the way, leaving the false impression that what’s affluent is normal and that anything else isn’t adequate.

It’s needlessly scaring us. A new survey by State Street Global Advisors finds that before retirement most Australians believe they won’t have enough to live on, but that after retirement most are happy: two-thirds say their standard of living is no worse and a significant minority say it is better.

The truth is that living costs plummet on retirement. Most retirees no longer face a mortgage, a saving of 30 per cent. Most no longer pay tax, no longer have children living at home, and no longer habitually save up to 10 per cent of each pay packet. They also no longer incur the substantial costs of heading out of home and going to work: petrol, parking, work clothes and the temptations of the office cafeteria. And they have more time to shop and cook, meaning they get better value and pay less for food. So comfortable are retirees spending far less than the industry says they need to, that most actually save.

In his earlier incarnation as social services minister Scott Morrison revealed that in their first five years in retirement 57 per cent of pensioners either build up their savings or keep them steady.

In their last five years 67 per cent do so. A Productivity Commission survey released last week finds that only 5 per cent of retirees stop saving when their income drops on retirement. But outrageously inflating the cost of living for retirees is only the first of the industry’s tricks. The second is to imply that all of it has to come from super.

The astonishing truth, outlined by Morrison in a speech as Treasurer last month, is that super accounts for only 15 per cent of the assets of Australians over the age of 65, and only 20 per cent of their income.

As the Grattan Institute put it in a recent report: superannuation is the least important part of the retirement incomes system. Retirees have much more invested in real estate than super, and “at all ages, incomes and wealth” more invested in other financial instruments than in superannuation.

“It is unreasonable to expect superannuation savings alone to fund a comfortable living standard in retirement,” the institute says. It follows that it is unreasonable to believe that the super system needs to grow or stay as it is in order to provide decent retirements. Labor is blind to evidence when it comes to superannuation.

In thrall to the legend of Paul Keating and the myths propagated by the industry he helped create, it wants to lift compulsory contributions from 9.5 per cent of salaries to 12 per cent. Morrison is more clear-eyed.

Some retirees are genuinely poor. They are the ones paying rent. The Productivity Commission says they typically have to dole out $240 a week and are vulnerable to eviction. Shamefully, when Kevin Rudd lifted the age pension in 2009 he all but ignored the finding from his pension review that rent assistance was far too low. It remains unindexed at $120 a fortnight.

There may well be other Australians for whom retirement is uncomfortable, notwithstanding the pension of $20,498 for singles and $30,903 for couples. But for most it’s OK, no worse than working. There’s no need to hand a $2 trillion industry tax concessions in order to help them.

Peter Martin is economics editor of The Age.

Source: Theage.com.au

Government jobs program falls 95 per cent short of target

The Age older workers

 

A federal government program designed to get older Australians back into work has been branded a dismal failure, with only 1700 people joining the scheme meant to benefit 32,000.

Department of Employment documents reveal just 1735 people took advantage of the Restart scheme in its first year of operation – about 5 per cent of the government’s target.

Announced with much fanfare in the 2014 budget, the program provides a wage subsidy of up to $10,000 to employers who give jobs to people aged over 50 who have been unemployed for more than six months.

Labor said the program is clearly missing the mark. Advertisement “It’s the government’s program that needs a restart as it’s proving to be a dismal failure,” opposition spokesman Brendan O’Connor​ said. “No amount of rhetorical flourish from the Prime Minister can hide the real reason the program doesn’t work – there simply are not the jobs available.”

But Employment Minister Michaelia Cash said the government remains “firmly committed” to the program, which is part of a $1 billion investment to establish a single wage subsidy pool.

She said the program has now helped a total of 2500 mature-age workers, including those helped since July 1. “Restart is a demand-driven programme and the government budgeted for a maximum uptake of 32,000,” she said.

Nonetheless, Ms Cash has announced changes designed to improve uptake. The subsidy will now be paid over 12 months rather than 24 and other measures have been taken to reduce complexity and red tape.

Older workers face significant barriers to entering the workforce. On average, they spend 61 weeks on the unemployment queue, compared to 37 weeks for all other people.

“That is why Restart was developed, to give an added incentive to employers to hire a mature-age worker,” Ms Cash said. Both major parties have long struggled to encourage employers to hire mature-age Australians. Indeed, just 230 employers took advantage of a $1000 annual subsidy under the two-year life of the Rudd/Gillard government’s Experience+Jobs Bonus scheme, which was also designed to get over 50s into work. It was meant to benefit up to 10,000 employers.

Source: The Age/Adam Gartrell

Mature-age workers a valuable resource

 

  • OCTOBER 01, 
Businesses benefit from hiring mature-age staff.

Businesses benefit from hiring mature-age staff.

BABY Boomers have been the backbone of Australia’s workforce for many years.

The boomer generation, which numbers more than 5.5 million, has helped build the country’s economy and shape its society.

And, over the next decade or two, they’ll change that working landscape yet again as they retire from paid employment.

This exodus will have an impact across Australia, including in the Geelong region. Mature-age workers bring valuable expertise, knowledge and life experience to Geelong’s varied businesses and organisations.

They add diversity, productivity and stability and play a crucial role in mentoring our next wave of workers and leaders.

And many of them are not ready to go. They’re reluctant to down tools, pack away the briefcase and leave their jobs — for financial reasons, personal choice and a strong sense of purpose.

Australian Bureau of Statistics labour force data reveals a significant increase in employment numbers over the past five years for older workers in the Geelong region, which includes the City of Greater Geelong, Surf Coast Shire, Borough of Queenscliffe and most of Golden Plains Shire.

In mid-2010 there were about 17,300 people aged 55 years and over in part and full-time employment.

Flip the calendar to mid-2015, and that figure has jumped by 6900 to about 24,200.

That’s good news for Geelong’s employers. Businesses can and do benefit greatly from productive mature-age workers but they’ll need to take a flexible approach to keep that valuable intellectual capital within their ranks as retirement beckons.

Options of part-time work and flexible hours make paid employment more attractive to mature-age people looking to balance a job with lifestyle changes as they transition towards retirement.

And it might be enough to keep this valuable human resource within Geelong’s workforce for longer.

But it’s not just skills and knowledge that slip away as mature-age workers retire.

Workplace participation rates across Australia will be impacted too, with governments’ strongly encouraging older people to remain in employment longer to stave off a forecast shrinking pool of workers in coming decades and help counteract the economic ramifications of an ageing population.

While the catchcry of “youth are our future” is true, we ignore the mature-age worker at our peril. They’re important now and will remain so in the future.

— Rob Birch is chief executive officer of Gforce Employment Solutions, which supplies employment services to Geelong, Ballarat and Wyndham regions.

 

Source:  Geelong Advertiser

Working until 70 a health struggle for over 20 per cent of us

The government wants Australians to keep working until they are 70, to reduce pressure on the aged pension, but new research shows that nearly a quarter of people now in their 40s will be too sick to stay in the workforce.

Treasurer Joe Hockey last year proposed lifting the age at which people are entitled to full access to their superannuation, known as the preservation age, from 65 to 70 for anyone born after January 1966.

In 2035, when the change would take effect, the majority of retired or unemployed Australians in their sixties will not have enough superannuation to fund their retirement.

Rather than simply working longer, we need to re-think our approach to retirement. Reaching a certain age shouldn’t mean we need to leave the workforce entirely.”: AMP chief customer officer Paul Sainsbury. Photo: Dean Sewell

Potential impacts of changes to the preservation age are a focus of a self-initiated research project currently being undertaken by the Productivity Commission.

“Rather than simply working longer, we need to re-think our approach to retirement. Reaching a certain age shouldn’t mean we need to leave the workforce entirely. Early years in retirement should be a transition period with reduced levels of work, giving people more time to focus on their interests and wellbeing, while still saving money,” AMP chief customer officer Paul Sainsbury said.

The AMP/NATSEM report concludes that if the pension age is raised to 70 many Australians will need to consider working longer to have an income and build more retirement savings, but this will be a problem for those who are no longer in good enough health to do so.

Working longer will be a challenge for one in five men and one in four women who are predicted to be in fair or poor health when aged 60-69 in 2035, the report finds.

“The good news is that Australians are living longer. But we know more years in retirement places more strain on our superannuation balances so it’s likely many of us will need to work longer. But this raises some confronting questions, in particular, how healthy we will be in the later years of our working life and what our financial position will be,” Mr Sainsbury said.

The report also finds that those people currently aged in their 40s who don’t consider themselves in good health now, are less likely to be well enough to still be working in 20 years time. The need to save more now is more urgent for this cohort.

More than 50 per cent of workers aged 60-69 are professionals. Manufacturing, electricity and construction sectors employ one in four men aged 60-69. The education and health sectors dominate the employment of women.

Australia’s self-assessed health status is ranked fourth in the OECD and similar to that for Switzerland, Sweden and the United States. Canada and New-Zealand are healthier than Australia.

“There is an important role employers can play to help re-design the workplace of the future so that older workers can stay at work for longer and transition to retirement in a way that suits them, while building wealth and income along the way,” Mr Sainsbury said.

Source: The Age Business Day

Aussie employers ‘giving up’ on tackling talent shortage

A new study has found that although Australia’s talent shortage is continuing to be a prevalent issue, the number of employers implementing a strategy to deal with it is down by 5% from last year.

ManpowerGroup Australia’s tenth annual Talent Shortage Survey, which interviewed over 1,500 employers around the country, found that 42% of Aussie employers are struggling to fill roles.

Researchers found that employers are stepping away from addressing the talent shortage at a rate of one and a half times their global counterparts.

Lincoln Crawley, managing director at ManpowerGroup Australia and New Zealand called this pattern “alarming and disappointing”.

“Globally we have seen the number of businesses taking on strategies to counter the talent shortage increase, while on home soil this number has dropped dramatically over a 12 month period,” he said. “Australian employers are giving up.”

Crawley advised employers to tie a talent shortage strategy in with offering unorthodox ways of working.

“We are observing a divergence across the economy,” he said. “Employers who fail to adopt non-traditional work practices risk becoming irrelevant to the new generation of workers, while those that innovate will succeed.”

Experts at ManpowerGroup Australia shared the following tips with HC on how to address and tackle a skills shortage:

1. Have strong training and development programs so staff are continuously learning and growing

2. Establish realistic and regular incentive programs

3. Promote a family-friendly and flexible work environment while maintaining high standards of work and results

4. Utilise new parents returning to the workforce and consider job sharing to maximise the flexibility they are offered

5. Consider older staff – hiring over 50s qualifies companies for a government subsidy

6. Consistently work on strengthening your company’s point of difference to attract and retain the best in the industry

7. Communicate with your people regularly

8. Don’t forget to praise staff when they do a good job

9. Make efforts to inject fun into the workplace so people are excited and motivated even when times are tough

10. Design medium to long term career plans to give staff visibility to all potential career paths

Employers around Australia reported that the most difficult roles to fill were management and executive positions, skilled trades and sales representatives. Skilled trades have remained the most challenging positions to fill for nine years.

“While skilled trades have continued to be the hardest roles to fill for nearly a decade, the demand profile has changed in recent years,” said Crawley. “Demand for roles like electricians and mechanics has eased, while a shift in infrastructure developments across the country is seeing demand outstrip supply for specialist engineers, labourers and skilled trades in infrastructure and construction.”

He added that one of the biggest challenges posed to employers was finding “ready-made specialists, rather than investing in developing existing skills”.

Crawley also called for employers to ensure that IT workers are being invested in so that they can reskill to remain relevant, adding that many IT roles are becoming obsolete.

According to the study’s findings, employers are aware of the constraints that skills shortages are putting on their company despite their apparent reluctance to take action.

Forty-six per cent said that skills shortages were reducing their ability to serve their clients, 33% said they were a hindrance to their organisation’s productivity and competitiveness, and 23% said it lowered employee engagement and morale.

The ten most difficult jobs to fill in 2015:

1.     Skilled trades
2.     Management / executives
3.     Sales representatives
4.     Engineers
5.     Technicians
6.     Labourers
7.     Accounting and finance staff
8.     Drivers
9.     IT Staff
10.   Secretaries, PAs, receptionists, administrative assistants and office support staff

Source:  HC Online

Surprising Ways Older Workers Find Second Act Jobs

150331_RET_Job_1
Alamy

If you’re older and have been out of work for a while, try these strategies to land a new job

A new report by the AARP Public Policy Instituteuncovered some surprising strategies that older workers are using to get back into the workforce.

That’s important because, while the job market is significantly better overall, the situation is still dismal for the long-term unemployed. The jobless rate for people out of work six months or longer is 30% vs. 5.5% overall.

Older workers make up a distressingly large portion of that group: 45% of job seekers 55 and older have been looking for work for six months or longer.

The AARP report examined the job search strategies that led to reemployment for people age 45 to 70 who were unemployed some time during the last five years.

It found big differences in job search strategies between older workers who landed jobs and those who are still not working.

The overall picture is mixed: Among those older workers employed again after a long time out of the workforce, some were earning more, getting better benefits, and working under better conditions. But for many, the jobs were not as good as the ones they had lost: 59% of long-term unemployed older workers made less money, while 15% earned the same and 25% made more.

So, what set the successful job seekers apart? These moves stand out.

  • Embrace change. Almost two-thirds of reemployed older workers found jobs in an entirely new occupation and women were more likely to find work in a new field than men. Of course, some of the unemployed didn’t choose to switch occupations. But for others, the change was a decision to do work that was more personally rewarding and interesting or even less stressful with fewer hours. Whether it was by choice or design, broadening your job search may pay off.
  • Go direct. Older reemployed workers were much more likely—48% vs. 37% of those still looking for work—to contact employers directly about jobs instead of just applying to the black hole of online job postings.
  • Network strategically. Everyone knows that networking is the best way to get a new job but apparently talking to everyone you know may not be the most effective method. While half of those who landed a new job reached out to their network for leads, only 34% of the unemployed used personal contacts at all. But the reemployed were less likely to rely on friends and family to find out about job opportunities, focusing instead on professional contacts.
  • Move fast. When hit with a job loss, many people use it as a time to take a break or think about what they want to do next. That lost time can cost you. The reemployed were much more likely to have begun their job search immediately or even before their job ended than those who are still unemployed.

A couple other surprising findings about what works and what doesn’t: Conventional advice is that the long-term unemployed need to keep their skills up to date if they are jobless for a while. While that can certainly help, additional training didn’t make much difference between those who landed a job and those who remained out of work.

As for social media: While 56% of the reemployed found job boards a good source of job leads, just 13% said online social media networks such as LinkedIn and Facebook were effective in helping them get a new job.

Among the most ineffective strategies: Using a job coach, talking with a headhunter, and consulting a professional association.

Part-pension eligibility may be tightened in wake of outcry over cuts

Scott Morrison to ‘consider seriously’ the alternative proposal following complaints about the plan to cut pension increases laid out in the budget

Guardian

 

 

The Abbott government is considering limiting wealthy retirees’ eligibility to the part-pension as an alternative to its controversial budget policy to cut the rate of pension increases, the social services minister, Scott Morrison, has said.

Morrison signalled the potential backdown after the government faced nearly a year of internal and external criticism for its decision to confine pension increases to the consumer price index from 2017.

Groups including the Australian Council of Social Service (Acoss) have repeatedly argued the original budget measure would erode the value of the pension relative to wages over time, and the government should instead consider tightening eligibility rules for the part-pension.

Morrison said he would “consider seriously” the Acoss proposal because the government was “wedded to the goal” of a sustainable and adequate pension system rather than any particular measure.

The chief executive of Acoss, Cassandra Goldie, said the plan to target the pension to those who most needed it would involve “reducing the current threshold that allows couples with as much as $1.1m in assets on top of the family home to qualify for a part-pension”.

Goldie spelled out her alternative proposals in a statement issued on Wednesday. Acoss proposed reducing the cut-out point for the part-pension for couples to $794,250 in assets besides the family home, saving the government an estimated $1.45bn in 2016-17.

Morrison signalled his openness to the plan. He said he had asked the sector and crossbench senators “if they have better proposals to make our pension sustainable”, and he would “keep on the table measures until there are new measures to put on the table”.

“What I am saying particularly in relation to the pension is that the proposal put forward by Acoss today is something we will consider seriously. I am interested in getting an outcome and a solution here that delivers a sustainable pension for all Australians, not just those today but those in the future,” Morrison said in Adelaide.

“Acoss, by putting this forward today, understands that that is something we have to address. We can’t just stick our head into the sand which is what the Labor party appear to be doing.”

Morrison said the government was aiming to “get to a point where we can be in agreement about the measures that will deliver a sustainable pension”.

“That is what I am wedded to,” he said. “The government is wedded to the goal and our goal is to have a sustainable and adequate pension into the future and it is clear that if you keep just going down the path that Labor is suggesting which is to stick your head in the sand and do nothing then you will run the pension off the edge of a cliff.”

The opposition leader, Bill Shorten, refused to say whether he would support the proposed changes to the pension asset test.

“I’m not going to give this government a blank cheque,” Shorten told the ABC on Thursday.

“What I would support is well thought out, detailed policies, which they haven’t put to us. The discussion in this morning’s newspapers is nothing more than Scott Morrison having a thought bubble.”

Shorten said there was still no concrete proposal on the table, but the government appeared to finally be admitting problems with its pre-existing policy to cut pension indexation.

“It is correct that Labor has opposed the government cutting the rate of pension indexation and today for the first time it appears that after nearly a year of Tony Abbott and Joe Hockey saying government policies were unfairly being targeted by Labor through a scare campaign, for the first time we see chinks in the armour of the government’s propaganda campaign where they have tried to pretend that somehow what they were doing was good for pensioners.”

At a later media conference, Shorten left the door open to supporting changes to part-pension eligibility, which would spare the government the need to seek crossbench support in the Senate

“Labor has always been up for making sure that we have the fairest possible system, but pensioners of Australia should not have to consider the Abbott government’s budget measures with a gun to their head which is cuts to $80 a week in pension indexation,” he said.

Labor’s families spokeswoman, Jenny Macklin, said the government “should put carefully considered proposals to the public and then we can all look at them in a proper way”.

The Greens senator Rachel Siewert said her party supported calls for “a broad review of retirement income instead of fragmentary changes to the pension.”

“This review should include looking as the assets test and changes to super concessions,” she said.

The pension indexation changes were announced in the government’s first budget, delivered in May last year, but faced a Senate obstacle.

Morrison has been signalling for some time that he was looking at the pension issue. He recently proposed reviewing the adequacy of the pension every three years in an attempt to win crossbench support for the indexation changes.

Morrison said community and seniors’ groups and the independent senator Nick Xenophon had offered constructive alternatives in what he described as a “coalition of ideas”.

He said the government would “work through these measures in careful detail and seek to cost them fully”.

Source: The Guardian

Grey army marches back to work

 

Older Worker

Joyleen Thomas, 73, works full-time in the aged care sector as an administrator, the oldest worker in the 2000-employee ACH Group. Picture: Kelly BarnesSource: News Corp Australia

JOYLEEN Thomas’s career began at 42, after she spent two decades out of the paid workforce to raise her family.

Now approaching 74, Mrs Thomas has worked from the “bottom of the rung” to become the oldest full-time worker of 2000 employees at aged care provider ACH Group and has no plans to retire.

Part of her job at ACH’s Adelaide headquarters is to evaluate programs to improve the quality of life of aged care residents.

“I have no idea when I will give up work … quite a lot of people I know have left and then come back into the workforce. My ­husband is an accountant; he works two days a week and he’s older than me,’’ she said.

INTERACTIVE: The InterGenerational Report

“It’s my choice. My husband says that I’m healthier and more vibrant than when I was home with my children. What we know today is that people like me may live to 100 — we don’t want to just exist for those years.”

Mrs Thomas said although her husband had experienced ageism when seeking work after an initial retirement at 67, she had felt no pressure to retire from her role.

Although the Intergenerational Report projects Australians over 65 will increase workforce participation this year, reaching 17.3 per cent in 2054-55, finding a job at an advanced age was proving difficult, said Mark Henley, advocacy manager for ­financial counselling and community support service Uniting Communities.

He said financial pressures were forcing more older people back to work beyond retirement.

“We see more older people wanting and needing work ­because they can’t afford to retire. Jobs for older people is more the issue we see,’’ he said.

Council on the Ageing South Australian chief executive Jane Mussared said the report’s aim to increase Australians’ longevity and health should be celebrated.

“But we also need to increase the opportunities for older people to stay in and, in many cases, get back into, the workforce,’’ she said.

Although work participation rates are expected to fall by 2.2 per cent to 62.4 per cent by 2055, Ms Mussared said the participation rate of people aged over 55 was climbing slowly climbing.

 

Source The Australian

Employers called on to value older workers

Tom Lowrey

Posted 

Primer Minister elect Tony Abbott with Cowper MP Luke HartsuykerPHOTO: Cowper MP Luke Hartsuyker with Prime Minister Tony Abbott

Assistant Employment Luke Hartsuyker says local employers need to start seeing the value of older workers.

The Federal Government’s Intergenerational Report, released yesterday, found people will need to retire much later in decades ahead due to the ageing population.

Just 13 percent of people aged over 65 are currently working or looking for work.

Older workers bring to their enterprise a wealth of experience

Assistant Employment Minister and Cowper MP, Luke Hartsuyker

Mr Hartsuyker said those numbers are going to have to rise, as people continue to live much longer lives.

The Cowper MP said employers also have a role to play, in placing more trust in older workers.

“I think it’s important that employers actively look for the benefits that older workers can bring,” he said.

“The Government has a role to play in providing incentives, where appropriate – that’s an important step.

“But I think its important that employers take into account that older workers bring to their enterprise a wealth of experience, a lifetime of experience.”

Mr Hartsuyker said the future of the nation’s economy depends on people working much later into their lives.

“That’s an important element, that we engage our older workers in the workforce, keep them in the workforce and keep them contributing, if we’re going to have the sort standard of living that we want for our future.”

Source: ABC

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