In 2005 HSBC published the
results of its first global survey, The Future of Retirement in a World of Rising
Life Expectancies. That survey covered 11,000 adults (aged 18 and over) in ten
countries and territories across four continents.The first global study to investigate
people’s hopes, dreams, priorities, aspirations and fears, it showed that
across the globe attitudes towards ageing and later life – and people’s
expectations of it – were positive. The survey also showed that people
want more flexibility and freedom in the way they retire than employers and
laws often allow.
This year’s report,
The Future of Retirement: What the world wants, has been undertaken by HSBC
in collaboration with three leading organisations. The report is authored by
the Oxford Institute of Ageing, part of Oxford University. The lead advisor
was Age Wave, a consultancy headed by gerontologist Dr Ken Dychtwald, HSBC’s
Special Advisor on Global Ageing, and the global fieldwork was undertaken by
Harris Interactive.
More than 21,000 adults
have been interviewed in 20 countries and territories across five continents,
which comprise 62% of the world’s population. Following on from last year’s
report, which examined people’s attitudes to ageing, retirement and later
life, The Future of Retirement: What the world wants extends the investigation
to cover families, the workplace and the role of governments in meeting people’s
hopes and dreams. This year more than 6,000 private-sector employers have also
been surveyed across the same 20 countries and territories, gauging their attitudes
to older workers and the issues presented by global
ageing and changing models of retirement.
The scope and nature of
this survey make it the largest of its kind ever conducted. The Future of Retirement:
What the world wants is split into three documents:
• The Future of Retirement: What people want, aimed at a general audience
and focusing on our survey of the general public.
• The Future of Retirement: What businesses want, aimed at employers and
focusing on our survey of them.
• This executive summary, which provides an overview of both reports and
introduces the subject of ageing populations.
There is a range of data
contained in these three reports. For further in-depth analysis and supporting
material log on to www.thefutureofretirement.com
Main conclusions
The results of this year’s
Future of Retirement survey supply much cause for optimism. They show that individuals
the world over are realising the practical limitations on what their governments
and employers can do to support them in later life, and they reveal that the
greatest proportion of people believe
that the solution is for individuals to take responsibility for their own future,
helped along by governments and employers. We must all, as individuals, tailor
our
expectations to this new state of affairs. We know that people live longer,
stay healthier and want to be more active in later life, and we should expect
these developments to have an effect on the way we manage our working lives
and the transition to retirement. For example, in order to fulfil our aspirations
for
a similar standard of living in retirement as in working life, we will need
to save more. Working beyond the age of 65 will also help, and it will bring
other benefits, as our survey respondents indicate, such as providing meaningful
and valuable activity and giving us a way to stay engaged with other people
of all ages.
Employers need to recognise these facts about the ways their employees will
want to work, the length of their working lives and the implications
for the way they are managed and rewarded.
These are significant changes,
and all employers will take time to digest them and to alter their processes,
practices and, above all, attitudes.
Because the changes required
will take time, employers need to start making them soon. Failing to do so means
suffering twice – once when our older workers leave, taking their knowledge
and experience with them, and again when the skills shortage becomes more severe
and we find it impossible to recruit older people.
We all need to take steps now in order to learn how to attract, recruit and
retain older workers. There is, for example, some evidence to show that older
people respond less well to traditional job advertising. Finding a solution
will take imagination, and will require HR departments to develop innovative
new methods that reach out beyond traditional recruitment practices.
Governments also need to
take action, working to support individuals and employers as they adapt. The
actions governments take will vary around the world, but everywhere they will
be of the same order: making it clear to citizens what they can expect of their
governments, what help is available, and what people must do
for themselves. Clarity, advice and support will be the keys. Setting the tone
will be an important part of this, moving social attitudes towards an acceptance
of older people as full and valued members of society, whether at work or outside
it.
Adapting to the world’s
ageing population won’t always be easy, but it is necessary. Our survey
gives us hope that the most important changes have already begun.
2007 Global key
findings
• People want to
pay for their retirement by means of government-enforced additional savings
rather than by paying higher taxes or taking lower pensions.
• People no longer believe that governments alone will provide for them
in old age.
• So long as they are healthy and able, people increasingly want to do
something active in their retirement rather than just resting.
• People overwhelmingly reject mandatory retirement on the grounds of
age.
• As they age, people increasingly demand flexible working practices.
• People believe that family, friends and fitness are more important than
money for a happy old age.
• The aspirations for retirement of “trendsetters” in the
transitional economies are beginning to converge with those in more advanced
economies.
• Employers feel that employees should be able to work to any age so long
as they are capable of doing a good job.
• Employers say that older workers are just as productive as younger workers.
• In all regions of the world, too little is being done to retain the
skills and experience of older workers.
• Few employers, large or small, are really prepared for the coming global
skills shortage that population ageing will cause.
HSBC’s Future of
Retirement survey has examined these trends for the first time, as they flow
from Western Europe and North America into the transitional economies of Latin
America, Eastern Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa.
Source : https://www.ageingforum.org
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