THE MEANING OF RETIREMENT. HOW LATE CAREER BABY BOOMERS ENVISION THEIR RETIREMENT

Abstract

The baby boom generation is now reaching retirement age. This generation is better educated, more vital and will live longer than their predecessors. It has been frequently argued that this and future cohorts have different needs and ambitions for retirement. Many of these ideas are based on experiences of counselors and qualitative investigations. Quantitative empirical evidence on how late career workers view their retirement is still scare. Based on the notion that identification with a youth culture can be a formative period in an individual’s life and highly generative of identities, ideas and perspectives that shape life, we explore whether individuals with a stronger identification with sixties ideas will have different needs and ambitions for retirement. We use data from a large scale sample survey among 6,800 older workers in the Netherlands, aged 60–65 at time of interview in 2015. For this research, we developed two new instruments (1) a set of survey items that measure the extent to which individuals identified with the sixties culture in their youth (e.g., hippie culture, protest generation, alternative lifestyles, feminism) (2) a set of survey items that measure the extent of their identification with various models of retirement. The data reveal that for a many baby boom older workers, retirement is primarily a period of rest and relaxation. However, many see retirement as a life phase giving the opportunity to explore new grounds. Individuals with a stronger identification with sixties culture in their youth have a more active view on retirement.