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Purpose: The authors analyse how the receipt of a wealth transfer (inheritance or gift) affects labour force participation in 14 EU countries. They compare the effect of receiving an inheritance or a gift and investigate different behaviours at the gender level and educational level and for elderly individuals. Design/methodology/approach: The authors use data from the Household Finance and Consumption Survey for 14 European countries and adopt an instrumental variable approach. They use information on the type of donor (family and nonfamily) to infer the degree of anticipation of a wealth transfer. Findings: The authors find that unexpected wealth transfers have a negative impact on labour force participation, with a stronger impact for gifts than for inheritances. For gender, they find larger negative impacts for females than for males, which is in line with a weaker attachment to the labour market. Receiving an unexpected wealth transfer may also result in early retirement. Originality/value: The paper offers a novel comparison of the effect of receiving an inheritance or a gift on labour force participation using a unique European dataset. The authors investigate whether males and females react differently to the receipt of a wealth transfer and the existence of different responses at the educational level and for elderly individuals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – Although policymakers have put great efforts into the promotion of older workers' labour force participation, quantitative empirical knowledge about employers' views towards extension of working lives is limited. The purpose of this paper is to improve the understanding of employers' attitudes and actions towards extension of working lives, by examining recruitment and retention behaviour towards older workers, employers' views on the consequences of an ageing workforce, organisational policies, and what governments can do to extend working lives. Design/methodology/approach – The authors analyse surveys administered to employers in Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Poland, Sweden and the UK in 2009. Findings – It is found that a minority of employers have applied measures to recruit or retain older workers, and employers rather retain than hire older workers. A considerable share of employers, albeit to different degrees per country, associate the ageing of their staff with a growing gap between labour costs and productivity. Employers expecting a larger gap do not apply more organisational measures to either increase productivity or adjust the cost-productivity balance. Employers may think the cost-productivity issue is partly for governments to solve; employers expecting a larger cost-productivity gap consider wage subsidies to be an effective measure to extend working lives. Originality/value – The paper addresses the employers' perspective, one that is often neglected compared to attitudes and behaviour of older workers themselves and research on institutional arrangements. This paper is also among the first to report on employers' policies and practices from a cross-national perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyse the main evolutions and the current situation of the 50-74 year olds on the labour market in eight European countries (Denmark France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Sweden, Poland and the UK). Design/methodology/approach – Based on a cross-country comparative approach, this overview draws on detailed analysis of the situation of older workers and public policies in each of the selected countries but also on a wide range of available studies and statistics on employment and welfare outcomes. Findings – The eight selected countries display similarities: a u-shaped pattern of employment rates of older workers (55-64 years old) over the last 40 years, with an increase since the mid 1990s, the later exit of higher educated workers and the higher prevalence of non-standard employment contracts among older workers. On the other hand, considerable disparities can be observed regarding the gender gap in employment rate, current employment rates, self-employment and part-time employment among older workers. Social implications – Specific questions will be more acute with the effective postponement of retirement: increasing inequalities between groups of older workers, increasing uncertainty about the age of retirement, the way to keep lower educated workers in their jobs, sustainable working conditions, increasing risks of age discrimination, and impact of care of older relatives. Originality/value – This paper offers a synthetic overview with a special attention paid to the main features of the countries' exit patterns at the end of the working life, the prevailing public policies and the specificity of the different national employment and societal models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper (overview) is to provide a brief introduction to the topic of active ageing and summarise the seven studies included in this special issue. The authors also acknowledge those who were instrumental in bringing this issue to fruition. Design/methodology/approach – The International Journal of Manpower's usual double-blind review process was used to select the seven papers included in this special issue. The papers themselves all have a cross-national perspective using data from eight European countries. These papers represent a wide variety of designs, methodologies and analytic strategies used to study active ageing in the paid labour force as well as in civil society. The papers make use of large-scale surveys among employers and volunteers, case studies in organisations, and vital statistics. Findings – The findings of the studies included in this special issue provide insights into the factors and mechanisms that hamper higher participation levels of older adults in paid employment and civil society, and give suggestions on how to improve their inclusion and how to deal with an ageing workforce. Originality/value – Taken as a collective, the papers in this special issue help propel forward in significant ways the study of active ageing from an international and interdisciplinary perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - Given the ongoing demographic change in European countries, this paper aims to explore empirically the link between age structures of employees in firms and firm performance. Design/methodology/approach - Based on theoretical considerations, the paper examines the link between both the average age and the standard deviation of employees' age and firms' value added per employee. Linked employer employee data of all private-sector firms in Denmark with at least 20 employees is used. Findings - A pyramidal or inverse U-shaped interrelation is found between mean age and standard deviation of age and value added per employee, respectively. Research limitations/implications - It would be interesting to determine whether the results hold for different countries with other institutional environments. Originality/value - This is the first paper to examine the link between corporate age structures and firm performance for a whole country. The paper gives insights for both academic scholars and practitioners, who may take the results into account in formulating an efficient personnel policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose -- This paper aims to offer a typology of temporary workers, based on their motives for accepting their work arrangement, which includes voluntary, involuntary and stepping-stone motives, and relate this typology to various individual and work-related variables. Design/methodology/approach -- Latent class analysis of 645 European workers was used to construct a typology of temporary workers. Variation of individual and work-related variables between types of temporary workers was analyzed using ANOVA. Findings -- The analyses suggest that there are three types of workers: involuntary temporary workers highlight the involuntary motive and the stepping-stone motive; the stepping-stone type stresses the stepping-stone motive only, and the non-involuntary group disagrees with all three motives. Moreover, the groups differed significantly on important work-related variables such as occupational position, tenure, employability, and work-involvement. However, differences in individual variables were limited. Research limitations/implications -- The research puts forward a more complex typology of temporary workers than is usually suggested. Moreover, the study shows a non-involuntary group for which temporary employment can become a trap, and hence these workers should be targeted by future policy and interventions. Originality/value -- The research offers a typology of temporary workers, which is founded on motivation theory, and existing research on motives for accepting temporary employment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose — The purpose of this paper is to analyse the extent to which the quality of the jobs of low-skilled young workers is affected by the structure of education and training systems in various European countries. It focuses on the differences between countries providing fairly general education (internal labour market (ILM) contexts) and countries offering more specific vocational education (occupational labour market (OLM) contexts). Design/methodology/approach — Logistic regression analyses. Findings — It is found that low-skilled young workers are worse off in OLM countries than in ILM ones, with respect to employment in a permanent job, employment in a non-elementary job and participation in continuing vocational training. However, in OLM countries low-skilled young workers are less often involuntary part-time employed than those in ILM countries. With regard to participation in continuing vocational training, the ILM-OLM contrast is larger in manufacturing than in services; regarding employment in a permanent job the reverse is true. Originality/value — It is shown that the labour market position of low-skilled young workers is affected by the structure of education and training systems in various European countries. The upgrading of the skills demanded in the European ‘knowledge economies’ will therefore have less severe consequences for low-skilled young workers in ILM countries than in OLM countries, since the acquisition of occupationally specific skills is organized differently between the two institutional contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - To investigate the reasons for the persistent rise in European (Euro area) unemployment during the 1990s, especially compared to the USA. Design/methodology/approach - An econometric model of the European labour market is estimated based on the bargaining framework outlined by McDonald and Solow. A data set is constructed by aggregating individual country data. Because of the lack of adequate data, the supply side is treated as an unobserved component and estimated using the Kalman Filter. Findings - The rise in European unemployment is predominately due to the slow and incomplete reaction of the supply side to negative demand shocks in the labour market. The traditional factors which generate low flexibility in the labour market are to blame. Research limitations/implications - The extent to which the differences in unemployment between the Euro area and the USA can be accounted for by differences in labour productivity is identified as an important issue for future research. Originality/value - The paper shows how standard bargaining models can be used to explain poor unemployment performance in the Euro area. The approach taken is original in the sense that the European labour market is modelled as a single entity rather than a collection of individual countries, and that unobserved component models are used to overcome the lack of supply side data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]