The Big Knit

According to Dr Nat O’Connor, Age Action’s Senior Policy Adviser: “Age Action strongly opposes the revival of the Employment (Restriction of Certain Mandatory Retirement Ages). Bill 2024, which is an inadequate response to the growing demand for the abolition of mandatory retirement.”

“Across political parties, in unions and among older persons, we see support for ending the practice of forcing people out of work before they are ready, but the proposed Bill makes no meaningful progress toward that end. The aim set out in its title, to restrict certain mandatory retirement ages, betrays its lack of ambition. All it provides for is the establishment of a complex, formal procedure so that employees can make a written request to stay on past their contractual retirement age; a request which can still be denied by their employer. This is the sole ‘restriction’ the Bill would impose on mandatory retirement.”

“This is a weak and ineffective Bill which is unlikely to help most employees who are forced out of work against their will for the offence of reaching a certain birthday. There is no reason for such timid action when we have seen other countries like Canada, New Zealand, Australia, the UK, and the United States abolish mandatory retirement entirely, in some cases decades ago. These countries have continued to enjoy well-functioning and productive labour markets and workplaces, showing that there is no foundation for the fears expressed by people who want to keep mandatory retirement.”

“Mandatory retirement is age discrimination. If the State allows a form of discrimination to be practiced, it must set out clear justifications for the practice. However, the popular arguments in favour of mandatory retirement are all myths. There is no evidence that older persons are less able to contribute to a workplace, or that they cost more than they contribute, or that they prevent younger workers from gaining employment. In fact, research has demonstrated the many benefits older workers bring to workplaces, including institutional experience, mentoring, and soft skills like better stress management.”

“Mandatory retirement is based on gross and insulting stereotypes about ageing. It is experienced by workers as a humiliating and dehumanizing injustice. It takes away our autonomy and our control over how and when we retire, which is a major life event. People who had no choice in retiring report poorer mental health, life satisfaction, health status, dietary habits, marital satisfaction, self-efficacy, and income adequacy, even years into their retirement.”

Dr. O’Connor concluded: “The proposed Bill is an incomplete and inadequate response to the problem of mandatory retirement, and by virtue of its incompleteness, reinforces and legitimises the dangerous ageism on which mandatory retirement is founded. We want our new government to take strong and decisive action, rather than tinkering around the edges of a serious problem. The Bill needs to be abandoned in favour of legislation that really helps the workers who wish to remain in work for longer.”

Churn:
It is not reasonable to suggest that the abolition of mandatory retirement would create a large problem for companies, when the scale of churn in the labour market is already far higher. The Irish labour market experienced 12.8% churn in quarter 3 of 2024, meaning that 1 in 8 jobs were created, abolished or vacated during this period, which was 365,750 jobs (Central Statistics Office 2024).

Compared to this level of hiring and resignations, managing the relatively small number of older workers who may seek to work longer or whose productivity may fall in older age is a much smaller human resources management issue for companies.

CSO (2024) Labour Market Churn Q3 2024 https://www.cso.ie/en/releasesandpublications/fp/fp-lmc/labourmarketchurnq32024/

Age Action’s detailed policy paper outlining the case against mandatory retirement can be accessed here: https://www.ageaction.ie/sites/default/files/age_action_paper_abolish_mandatory_retirement.pdf