Abstract
This paper provides an overview of the employment situation of young and old workers in the EU Member States, setting out the most recent development during the crisis and dealing with policies implemented to promote the employment of both groups. The evidence collected shows that there is no competition between young and older workers on the labour market. Structural or general policies to enhance the functioning of EU labour markets are crucial to improving the situation of both groups. However, the responsibility for employment policies still predominantly lies within Member States of the European Union, although initiatives taken at the EU level can provide added value, particularly through stimulating the exchange of experiences and facilitating regional and cross-border mobility throughout the EU.
Highlights
Promoting early retirement was a frequently used policy to keep open unemployment low in a phase of massive industrial restructuring in the 1970s and 1980s or even more recently in many EU Member States
Conclusion and policy recommendations This paper provides an overview of the employment situation of young and old workers in EU Member States
Regarding the recent and present situation of young and old workers in European labour markets, it is evident that young people have suffered most from the recent crisis in terms of rising unemployment and declining employment, in countries where entry into employment and into permanent jobs, was even difficult before the crisis
Summary
Promoting early retirement was a frequently used policy to keep open unemployment low in a phase of massive industrial restructuring in the 1970s and 1980s or even more recently in many EU Member States. We use EU Labour Force Survey data for 2009 to provide an additional empirical assessment of the degree of substitutability between elderly and young workers, analysing the correlation between the labour force exit rate of workers aged 55 to 64 years old and the unemployment rate for several groups of young individuals, aged from 21 to 30 years old This analysis is conducted at a local labour market level for several EU countries including two nonEU countries. Among low educated individuals, a strong positive correlation emerges between the elderly male exit rate and the young males’ unemployment rate This finding contradicts the lump of labour, but it rather suggests the existence of an opposite effect: early retirement (among the low educated elderly workers) worsening the labour market conditions of the low educated young workers. Evidence from regional labour markets tend to suggest that early exit of elderly workers from the labour market may worsen the labour market outcomes of young individuals, as in the case of male and low educated workers
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