As policymakers around the world have been struggling with ways to deal with both demographic aging and looming budget deficits, the choices and constraints confronting older workers contemplating retirement have been changing rapidly. This timely and important book describes changes over time in employment at older ages, the timing of retirement, and pension income and how these changes correspond with historical demographic, economic, and policy changes. What is especially valuable is that this book gives readers insight into how these dynamics are playing out around the world in countries such as Denmark, Estonia, Germany, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

The first chapter outlines the aim of the book—to understand how demographic aging and globalization may have impacted the employment, retirement, and income security of older adults. The authors expect to find increasing unemployment and downward income mobility among older workers, fewer workers taking early retirement, and lower pension incomes. They also expect these outcomes to increasingly differ by occupation. Each of the next chapters, separate articles written by different authors, focuses on one country. They begin with institutional information regarding the country's economy, employment structure, and welfare regime—including its public pension scheme, unemployment insurance, and disability benefits. They then report the results of analyses that use individual-level longitudinal data to analyze older workers' chances of becoming unemployed and reemployed, the characteristics associated with upward and downward income mobility in their careers, their likelihood of retiring, and their economic well-being in retirement. The final chapter summarizes the country-specific studies.

The choice of countries provides interesting comparisons. Although they all experience similar macroeconomics trends and face similar public policy issues, dramatic differences in their occupational structures and social welfare policies mean that outcomes are likely to be vastly different. For example, in the United States, the social welfare policy is designed to guarantee that individuals stay above some minimum level of economic well-being—a government defined poverty line. In Germany, the major goal of social welfare policy is to ensure that individuals maintain their relative economic position.

Between the 1970s and 1980s to 1990s, policymakers in all of the countries studied encouraged early retirement—through their public pension schemes, and sometimes using generous and easily accessible unemployment benefits and disability pensions. As a result, employment rates of older workers declined dramatically. Since then, demographic aging and projected budget deficits have forced policymakers to reverse the trend in early retirement through a number of reforms. In Germany and the United States, for example, public pension reforms increased the retirement age and increased the penalties for early retirement. In the Netherlands, legislative changes in the disability program made these benefits more difficult to receive. As a result, that country has seen a sharp decline in the number of disability beneficiaries—particularly among older adults. In Germany, policy changes made unemployment benefits more difficult to receive. Additional reforms in Germany and Sweden, for example, reduced the generosity of public pensions to save costs. In Italy, the 1995 government changed the country's public pension scheme from a defined-benefit PYG system to a defined-contribution PYG system. Denmark and Sweden seem to have done less in recent years than the other countries studied to reduce early retirement incentives; however, it is noted that employment among older workers in these countries was and is already comparatively high.

Although these policy changes are intended to keep older workers employed longer, it is not clear that there is demand for them. All of the countries studied have experienced an increase over time in the need for high-skilled, white-collars workers, but older workers often do not possess the right mix of skills. Rigid labor markets in Germany do not permit much adaptation—such as retraining—to such structural changes. Compared with younger workers, older workers in the Netherlands and Estonia are also less likely to receive continuing education and training. In contrast, employers in Denmark and Sweden can adjust rather easily to structural changes and job search, training, and retraining programs are common and effective. And then there are Italy and Spain, where many Italian older workers receive pensions and then become reemployed in the black market, while many Spanish older workers are already self-employed.

The longitudinal analyses show some different outcomes among the countries studied. In Germany, a conservative regime, more recent cohorts are delaying retirement and are less likely to use unemployment insurance as a pathway into retirement. Additionally, social inequality is growing because many lower-skilled workers are unable to continue working at older ages and must continue relying upon unemployment benefits—which are less generous now than they used to be—and upon less generous pensions when they retire. In the United Kingdom and the United States, liberal regimes, more recent cohorts are also delaying retirement. Although the risk of unemployment has increased across cohorts in the United States, so has the likelihood of reemployment. In the United Kingdom, pension incomes have generally increased across cohorts. In the United States, public pensions have decreased across cohorts, while occupational pensions have increased. In both countries, social inequality is growing between low-skilled and high-skilled older workers. Similarly, Hungary and Estonia, post-socialist regimes, show that later cohorts are likely to work longer and have a higher risk of unemployment than older cohorts.

In contrast to the other countries, Denmark and Sweden, social democratic regimes, show no signs of worsening prospects for older workers or declining pension incomes. More recent cohorts are delaying retirement and likely to become reemployed after losing their jobs. While there is no evidence that pension incomes have declined across cohorts, the gap in pension incomes between low-skilled and high-skilled workers has increased in Sweden. Similarly, Spain and Italy, fragmented regimes, show only a slight increase in the retirement ages of recent cohorts. In Italy, unemployment risks among older workers have increased slightly over time, but pension incomes have not changed much. Although older workers and retirees are not necessarily facing increased risks, a relatively large share of older Italians is vulnerable because they are self-employed and not covered by the pension system.

Despite the evidence presented in the country chapters, the editors conclude that ‘in most of the countries under study, late careers and retirement are still very secure for large parts of the older population’ (p. 323). They caution, however, that retirement programs and pensions are constantly being ‘retrenched’. In addition, many of the reforms discussed are still too recent to understand their full impact on the target populations. As a result, the future prospects for older workers and retirees are still uncertain.