Welcome to the TAEN/LSE/CROW Seminar Series. The series, which has been going on since 2010, is an open forum for discussing topical issues on age, work, and quality of life. Each session is structured around a particular theme and includes speakers from academia, business and stakeholder groups. We welcome feedback and would like to get your views on seminar events.
There are two streams of events: those in London and outside of London. After you take part in a seminar, please be sure to complete our survey after each session.
Transition from Work to Retirement: Extended or Precarious Working Lives?
London School of Economics, 2 May 2019
Our theme for this seminar was the growing precarity of older workers’ employment. In Guy Standing’s book The Precariat: The Dangerous New Class, the author argues that older people are increasingly joining the ‘precariat’, by taking low-level jobs to supplement dwindling pension incomes.
Building on this theme David Lain, Laura Airey, Wendy Loretto and Sarah Vickerstaff argued that many older workers, not just those in ‘precarious jobs’, feel a sense of ‘ontological precarity’, arising in large measure from pressures to work longer, combined with limited alternative employment prospects and inadequate retirement incomes.
Separately, in his February 2018 article for Ageing and Society, Chris Phillipson argued that the increasingly fragmented nature of late working life, with the emergence of varied transitions, including: bridge employment, second/third careers, part-time working, early retirement, and other variations, leads us to see ‘retirement’ as a “contested institution in the twenty-first century.” There is a need, he says, to review policies for later life working, focusing more on improving job quality and security and in a broader way, rethinking of the role of the “older worker.”
Research and Policy Issues on Active Ageing and Employment in Later Life
University of Sheffield, 24 October 2018
Our Older Workers Research Seminars broke new ground by visiting the University of Sheffield, where Professor Alan Walker and colleagues have ploughed deep furrows of research into age management and public policy, over nearly three decades.
Introduction Dr Tony Maltby, University of Sheffield,
Chair of Seminar Professor Matt Flynn, Hull University and Centre for Research into the Older Workforce (CROW)
Our seminar brought together three presenters:
Daniel Holman BA, MSc, PhD (Research Associate, University of Sheffield) presented Age Management approaches in the Social Care Sector. Daniel shared findings from two UK case studies in the social care sector from the project EXTEND. This is an important sector to focus on because of the rising demand for care, and the sector’s high proportion of older, female and part-time workers.
Alan Walker CBE, FBA, FAcSS Professor of Social Policy & Social Gerontology, spoke on Extending Working Lives, drawing on evidence from the formidable 32 partner project Mobilising the Potential of Active Ageing in Europe (MOPACT) which undertook a review across 13 countries of the social and economic challenges posed by population ageing.
Niall O’Reilly (Head of Work and Wellbeing, South Yorkshire Housing association) talked about The Role of Employment in Active Ageing. Niall explained how SYHA are taking a strengths-based approach to communicate the contributions that older workers make and the economic and moral case for extending working life. He also discussed how Working Win has joined up with Age Better in Sheffield, to reduce and prevent social isolation among older people.
Ageing workplaces in the regions
9 March 2018, University of Hull
As the UK prepares to leave the European Union, employers, government and other stakeholders are worried about the availability of skilled workers and the impact which labour shortages will have on business, especially in the North of England. This seminar focused on how older workers can be part of economic regeneration in the regions, but employers need to find new ways to mobilise the talents, particularly older jobless people and those seeking a mid-career job change.
This seminar was the inaugural regional seminar for the TAEN/LSE Seminar Series. The series has been running for seven years on the LSE campus, drawing attendees from academia, public services and think tanks. With CROW, the organisers are bringing the seminar ‘on the road’ in order to develop a regional network on older workforce issues.
In addition to two excellent speakers, we discussed a plan to develop a regional focused ‘Age and Work Laboratory’ to develop collaborative approaches to mobilising older talent.
