According to the paper: “Recent evidence, however, suggests that these internal labor markets are vanishing, as a more knowledge-based economy emphasizes general skills and fewer firm-specific skills. Indeed, recent research found improvement in the range of jobs available to older workers since the 1990s, at least for well-educated workers.
“Less-educated men, on the other hand, still faced a narrowing of opportunities in their 50s, accompanied by a fall in median wages.”
Fifteen percent of the openings on the RetirementJobs.com site were in office and administrative support (38% of these full time); 14% were in health-care support (29% of them full time); and 11% were sales jobs, such as those for cashiers (55% of which were full time). The total number of full-time jobs was 62%. One in 10 listings were devoted to computer and math jobs.
Geographically, the jobs here are distributed almost the same way jobs are distributed generally in the U.S., the paper says.
“Almost all the regions show average salaries within 5% of the national average. The exceptions are the South Atlantic region, which … has substantial government employment, and has salaries 107% higher than the national average, and the East South Central region, which has average salaries of only 82% of the national average.”
Relative to the size of the population over age 55, Washington, D.C., has a disproportionate share of listings, with nearly 10 listings per 1,000 individuals over age 55. (New England as a whole, for example, had 3.23 postings per 1,000 people; the Pacific region had 2.52).
Munnell’s co-authors on the report were Gal Wettstein and Abigail N. Walters.