November 2025
21Nov

The Aftermath of the Pandemic Retirement Boom

 By Lei Fang, Paul Mohnen & David Lee The labor force participation rate experienced a sharp drop during the pandemic, from which it has yet to fully recover. This shortfall can be attributed to a persistent decline in labor force participation among people aged 55 and older. In this blog post, we show that excess retirements relative to prepandemic and higher population shares of retirement-age individuals have both contributed to the decline in the labor force participation rate of older...

November 21, 2025
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10Nov

European nations have no choice but to raise retirement ages – our case study shows why

In early October 2025, with his political future hanging by a thread, France’s resigned-and-reappointed prime minister Sébastien Lecornu pledged to suspend unpopular pension reforms until 2027, when presidential elections will be held. Socialist MPs declared victory. The French business community groaned. The S&P downgraded France’s credit rating, citing budget concerns. With France kicking inevitable reforms at least two years down the road, and many European countries facing pension crises of their own, it is worth considering how to design pension reforms...

November 10, 2025
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10Nov

Thailand. Government revisits plan to raise civil service retirement age to 65

Thailand is revisiting the proposal to extend the civil service retirement age from 60 to 65, a reform aimed at addressing the ageing population and labour shortages. A report from the OCSC shows that, as of 2024, Thailand has 1.12 million government officials, including 414,088 civil servants, who are the main group under review for the proposed age extension. Other categories include 441,168 teachers, 268,063 local administrative officials, 213,086 police officers, 26,364 officials from independent constitutional agencies, 9,408 university civil servants,...

November 10, 2025
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October 2025
31Oct

Retirement and Retirement Intentions, Australia: Retiree statistics and the retirement intentions of people aged 45 years and over

By Australian Bureau of Statistics In 2024-25, 156,000 people aged 45 and over retired. Of these, 55% were women. On average, women retire at an earlier age than men. The average age both men and women are retiring is continuing to increase. The average age at retirement for people aged 45 years and over who retired in 2024-25 was 63.8 years. For men, the average age was 64.9 years and for women the average age was 62.7 years. The average age at retirement...

October 31, 2025
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20Oct

US. The Full Retirement Age Hits 67 in 2026–Here’s How To Avoid a 30% Benefit Cut

Social Security may have been created in 1935, but it’s a very dynamic system. Changes are made to the program every year, from the amount of the cost-of-living adjustment to more fundamental modifications. One “change” coming in 2026 that may seem sudden has actually been on the books since 1983, according to the Social Security Administration. But it’s an important one to be aware of because it could translate to a reduction in your Social Security check. Here’s what to know...

October 20, 2025
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07Oct

Later retirement expected in 2026 budget as Malaysia tackles economic pressures

Malaysians may be asked to retire five years later at 65 but should be spared any sharp tax rises in Friday’s budget, economists say, as Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim faces an economy hampered by an ageing population, high youth joblessness and surging living costs at the halfway point of his administration. About 8 per cent of Malaysia’s 34 million population are aged 65 and older, according to government data, firmly placing the Southeast Asian nation in the ageing nation category. At the same time,...

October 7, 2025
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03Oct

Pension Design and General Public Finances: Beyond Baseline Actuarial Neutrality

By Didier Blanchet & Gilbert Cette The design of pension benefits cannot be considered in disconnection from the constraints related to the general public finances. A change in the average retirement age has an impact not only on pension funding, but also on resources available for other public spending. Incorporating this externality implies penalties/bonuses for earlier/later retirement that are much higher than those designed to balance the pension system alone. Source SSRN

October 3, 2025
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02Oct

Calls to reform Australia’s pension age as labourers consider early retirement due to injury

In Australia, the pension age was lifted from 65 to 67 in 2023. For some manual workers, it's a physical struggle to continue working until 67. "For some, 67 is an achievable and even desirable pension age," said Professor Gary Martin, workplace specialist at the Australian Institute of Management. "For others, the road there is far more demanding." Carpenter and labourer Paul Quealy has some advice for young tradies. A man in a blue short-sleeved shirt, visor and tinted glasses with a dark patch...

October 2, 2025
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September 2025
19Sep

Commuting Time, Flexibility, and Job Security

By Bert van Landeghem, Thomas Dohmen & Arne Risa Hole We analyse workers’ preferences for wages, commute time, working-from-home, flexibility, job security, and social impact using discrete choice experiments from 2022 and 2025 with about 4,000 Flemish employees. Preferences for shorter commutes and flexible schedules remain stable post-pandemic, with substantial willingness-to-pay (WTP) for these attributes. However, WTP for job security declined and the value of socially impactful jobs disappeared by 2025. Latent class analysis identifies distinct groups differing in their...

September 19, 2025
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19Sep

65-year-old retirees in France now have higher incomes than working-age adults—meanwhile, American boomers can’t even afford to retire

French retirees officially bring in more income than their working-aged counterparts, as Americans are struggling to find the funds to retire and support their post-employment lifestyle. Due to France’s relatively young retirement age, lofty governmental spending on pensions, and high wage replacement rate, they’re now out-earning citizens with jobs as the country’s officials try and make unpopular changes. While boomers in the U.S. and UK are being forced to go back to work because they can’t afford to retire in...

September 19, 2025
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