Not Retired: Will Older Baby Boomers Find Jobs?

Maybe the recession really is over. Yes, the economic mandarins at the National Bureau of Economic Research—the official date-keepers of America’s booms and busts—declared the downturn finished in June 2009. Not many people bought into their judgment considering the unemployment rate was 9.5 percent at the time. The latest figures show that nonfarm payrolls rose in February, with the unemployment rate at 8.3 percent.

Sticking with jobs, downturns quicken the pace of economic change. Case in point: the older worker. Think tanks, blue chip commissions, and scholars have issued thousands upon thousands of reports calling for an aging baby boom generation to work well into the traditional retirement years. The downturn forced many boomers to get the message. They had borrowed too much, saved too little, and had the bad luck to watch their homes and 401(k)s plunge in value in recent years. The labor force participation rate for those aged 55 and older is higher than its level before the economic downturn. Among those 65 and over, it rose from 16.3 percent when the recession started in December 2007 to 18 percent in January 2012.

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