View cases - Stewart McKelvey

Page: 67would actually continue working is relatively small. Unconstrained by mandatory retirementpolicies, two-thirds of employees still choose to retire before age 65, with the average age ofretirement being 61. Empirical research suggests that there would be little effect on job creation foryounger workers if mandatory retirement were abolished.[256] As for the benefit of avoiding potentially demeaning performance monitoring for thoseemployees whose productivity may have declined with age, Dr. Kesselman observes that there is noevidence that ability or productivity abruptly declines at a specific age. He points out, somewhat2011 FC 120 (CanLII)ironically, that the mean age of the judges deciding McKinney was 65 years of age, and that severalof the judges were over that age.[257] Experience and reliability can compensate for declining abilities, says Dr. Kesselman.Moreover, employees whose abilities are in fact declining will be the ones most likely to choosevoluntary retirement.[258] Dr. Kesselman also points out that employers already need to have reliable performancemonitoring systems in place, and that such systems are all the more necessary for workers who havemany years in the workforce ahead of them. More importantly, he notes that there is no evidencethat costly new performance monitoring systems have in fact been implemented in jurisdictions thathave abolished mandatory retirement.[259] Dr. Kesselman says that mandatory retirement is not essential to the maintenance ofdeferred compensation schemes, given the evidence indicating that few workers would actually