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Retirement and Productive Activity in Later Life

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Abstract

It is commonly believed that as people age and leave the labor force, they disengage from productive activity and become dependent. While consistent with the conventional economic view of what constitutes productive activity, this belief is inconsistent with a more contemporary view that unpaid work (domestic, volunteer, and caring work) is equally economically valuable (i.e., productive). We investigate differences in how people allocate time among productive and other activities pre- and post-retirement. Results indicate that people remain engaged in productive activities even as they move out of the labor force, substituting unpaid for paid work. Only respondents who have exceeded their normal life expectancy greatly reduce their productive activity. Evidence suggests a need to revisit assumptions underlying policy debate on population aging.

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Notes

  1. Unpaid work regularly is estimated to be equivalent to 30–40% of GDP in developed countries. In Canada, in 1992, it was estimated at $285 billion, or 41.4% of GDP (Chandler, 1994).

  2. Defined here simply to mean time not in paid work.

  3. The total value of help and assistance to others provided by all Canadians over the age of 25 in 1992 was $10.9 billion which was 1.6% of the 1992 GDP (Statistics Canada, 2004).

  4. Stylized estimates of time spent on an activity typically are generated from questions such as “in the last week, how much time did you spend on (activity x).” Much of the literature reviewed in the previous section relied on such estimates. However, stylized time use data have been shown to systematically under- or over-estimate time spent on many activities (Robinson, 1985).

  5. The rescaled weights used in this analysis take into account the unequal probabilities of selection but do not take into account the stratification and clustering of the sample design (Statistics Canada, 1999).

  6. The majority of those who had last worked for pay prior to age 55 quit working long before they were 55. In fact, most of them last worked in their early 20s and 30s.

  7. This may be because the likelihood of helping others, and the amount of time spent doing so, is better explained by the recipients’ characteristics than the characteristics of the helpers. No data on recipients were available in the survey used in this study.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank Statistics Canada, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), and the University of Alberta for access to the data used in this study at the Research Data Centre at the University of Alberta. They also thank Agnes Pieracci, Research Project Assistant. While the research and analysis are based on data from Statistics Canada, the opinions expressed do not represent the views of Statistics Canada.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Alberta, 3-02 Human Ecology Building, Edmonton, AB , Canada T6G 2N1

    Donna Dosman, Janet Fast, Sherry Anne Chapman & Norah Keating

Authors
  1. Donna Dosman
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  2. Janet Fast
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  3. Sherry Anne Chapman
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  4. Norah Keating
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Correspondence to Donna Dosman.

Appendix

Appendix

Activity categories

Activity category

Activities included

Self-care

Eating, sleeping, washing, dressing, personal and medical care, prayer, meditation, thinking, travel for personal or religious activities

Leisure

Socializing, active leisure (exercise, walking, sports, gardening, hobbies, and games), and passive leisure (reading books, newspapers or magazines, watching television or videos, listening to the radio or stereo, general computer use, talking on the phone or writing a letter), and associated travel

Paid work

All time spent at a paid job, including time spent commuting to paid work

Unpaid productive work

Domestic work, caregiving, volunteer work

Household work

Meal preparation, baking, preserving food, associated cleanup, indoor and outdoor cleaning, laundry, ironing, folding and mending, shopping, household administrative management, gardening, plant and pet care, and other odd jobs

Caregiving

Childcare (personal care, medical care, teaching, assisting, reading and conversation with, playing with, travel for children and unpaid babysitting) and adult care (personal care, medical care and associated travel for adults within the household; housework, cooking, house maintenance/repair, transportation, correspondence and care for disabled or ill adults outside the household)

Volunteer work

Participation in professional or union organizations, political or civic activities, involvement in child, youth or family organizations, religious organizations, fraternal or social organizations, support groups, coaching and associated travel for any of these activities

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Dosman, D., Fast, J., Chapman, S.A. et al. Retirement and Productive Activity in Later Life. J Fam Econ Iss 27, 401–419 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10834-006-9022-y

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