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Mo n e y & Ma r k e ts<br />
You can’t just retire like<br />
you used to – at least this<br />
is true for many workers<br />
out there. Older workers<br />
staying employed, some<br />
well past retirement age, is one of<br />
the biggest trends of the recession.<br />
And although it may not be as<br />
comfortable for those forced<br />
to stay in the workplace longer<br />
than they expected, some<br />
good news has come out of<br />
the phenomenon.<br />
“We need to stop thinking<br />
of aging as going down<br />
hill,” says Jacquelyn B.<br />
James, director of research<br />
at the Sloan Center on Aging<br />
and Work at Boston<br />
College, in her recently<br />
publicized study. “The<br />
ideas that older workers<br />
are inflexible, unable to<br />
adapt and costly to employers<br />
is outdated in the<br />
current context of longevity<br />
and health.<br />
“People in their 50s and<br />
60s may well be at their<br />
peak – on average they<br />
are energized, reliable and<br />
engaged. The real cost<br />
that employers should<br />
weigh is the cost of losing<br />
experience. Older workers<br />
Working into<br />
retirement<br />
About the author<br />
Beth Seiser is careful not to call herself<br />
a native: She moved to Wellfleet at the<br />
ripe old age of 12. A graduate of Nauset<br />
Regional High School and Hampshire<br />
College in Amherst, Beth spent a year<br />
in Beijing and a year in Singapore as<br />
a Fulbright scholar and can now order<br />
fluently any Chinese dish on the menu.<br />
She writes for numerous local publications<br />
and her fiction has been included<br />
in “A Sense of Place: An Anthology of<br />
<strong>Cape</strong> Women Writers.” She is a single<br />
mother of two boys, and she spends a lot<br />
of time procrastinating about going to<br />
Beth Seiser<br />
OLDER<br />
WORKERS<br />
staying<br />
employed,<br />
some well past<br />
retirement<br />
age, is one of<br />
the biggest<br />
trends of the<br />
recession.<br />
have typically accumulated valuable<br />
knowledge and resilience and can be<br />
vital contributors in the workplace.”<br />
Elaine Argus, the district human<br />
resources manager for local The<br />
Home Depot stores, says that her<br />
company is actively recruiting older<br />
workers.<br />
“From my personal experience,<br />
definitely the one thing<br />
that sticks out is the fact of<br />
how reliable they are,” says<br />
Argus of older staffers. “Their<br />
work ethic stands out; the<br />
mature workforce takes<br />
reliability very seriously.“<br />
She goes on to extol<br />
their virtues: lots of experience,<br />
very adept at<br />
customer service and a<br />
sense of enjoyment being<br />
among the public. She<br />
says that older people<br />
come to her company<br />
from all kinds of backgrounds,<br />
ranging from<br />
executives to tradesmen<br />
and hobbyist.<br />
“We actually have<br />
incredible mentoring<br />
going on backwards and<br />
forward, with younger,<br />
computer-savvy employees<br />
helping the older<br />
workers maneuver around<br />
different systems, while<br />
the older workers help the<br />
younger ones learn some tricks of<br />
the trade,” Argus says.<br />
She also says that her <strong>Cape</strong> <strong>Cod</strong><br />
stores are particularly attracted to<br />
retirement-age workers. “Since <strong>Cape</strong><br />
<strong>Cod</strong> has a large retirement population,<br />
we’ve found that the mature<br />
workers in Hyannis are phenomenal.<br />
They’ve had great careers, they are<br />
very personable, and customers tend<br />
to like to have salespeople who mirror<br />
them in age and experience.”<br />
She says that spring and early<br />
summer are similar to other stores’<br />
Christmas season, as home repair<br />
the gym. PlEAsE sEE woRkIng, on page 7<br />
PRIMETIMECAPECOD.com 3
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