Employers' attitudes toward older workers and a sustainable working life in a public geriatric care and in private building and manufacturing companies, in Sweden

In most of the industrialized world, the proportion of older and retired people in the population is increasing. The active working part of the population must in a short future fund the not working and ageing population. There is research going on in Scandinavia to obtain knowledge about older workers’ work and life situation in association with their planning and decision to retire from working life. One of the results has shown that employers’ attitudes towards ageing workers play a major role in the decision-making to work beyond normative
retirement age or not. If it is desirable for society that the active workforce extend their working life it is important to provide a supporting environment inside working life. This requires a focus on organizations and employers’ attitudes towards ageing workers in order to provide incentives that keep older workers in the work force. This thesis will form part of a larger research project on the Institution of occupational and environmental medicine at Lund University. Future studies in this project aim to develop proposals on actions, interventions and recommendations regarding age adaptation/management.