Setting an Ideal Retirement Age
By Sibin Sabu* In the years to come, retirement age will play an increasingly important role in the framing of public policies of governments across the world. Retirement age has direct and indirect implications on the economic and social conditions in a society. Today, we can find that it varies from a minimum of 45 years in Turkey to 70 years in Australia. 1 Determining the age for retirement is a tricky job for any employer – whether it is the government or a private firm. Several factors play a role in it. Demography Increasing the retirement age allows a state to make use of the productivity of the elder citizens. In fact, there is no point in forcing a healthy and experienced employee to retire early. The term old age dependency ratio becomes relevant in this context. In simple terms, it represents the ratio of percentage of old age population to the working age population. This dependency ratio should be as low as possible and increasing the retireme...