More evidence of short-sighted corporate employment policies: the Federal Reserve predicts that the looming exodus of 50+ employees from the workforce will start putting the brakes on U.S. economic growth after 2010. Yet employers are doing little or nothing to retain older employers with more flexible work arrangements–and many continue to actively push out older workers due to their higher salary and benefit expense.

A Fed staff study projects economic growth after 2010 will be reduced by about one percentage point due to a labor force shortage associated with Boomer retirements. And that’s to say nothing about the harder-to-quantify brain drain some employers are worried about. And, of course, the worries about Boomer retirement costs sinking the Social Security system. What a disconnect. Boomers say they want to keep working past traditional retirement age, and U.S. economic health depends on it. When will employers wake up and start implementing policies aimed at keeping older workers on the job?

Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.), who chairs the Senate’s special committee on aging, is pushing legislation that would reward employers who establish flexible work schedules for older employees with tax credits. Other provisions of the bill include job training and a national clearinghouse for employers on hiring and retaining older workers. Kohl tells the Los Angeles Times: “We need to begin a national discussion to change the way we think about retirement. . “

This entry was posted on Monday, March 5th, 2007 at 9:42 am and is filed under Economy, Federal policy, Workforce. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.