How Job Changes Affect Retirement Timing by Socioeconomic Status

The brief’s key findings are:

• Workers in their 50s today, compared to previous generations, are more likely to switch jobs voluntarily.
• The question is whether such job changes lengthen or shorten a worker’s career.
• The results suggest that job changes lengthen careers: those who switch jobs are much more likely to still be in the labor force at age 65 than those who stay put.
• This effect is somewhat larger for better-educated workers than for less-educated workers.