[Labor market status and early retirement of elderly employees since 1980]

The labour market situation for older employees has become increasingly difficult in the first half of the 1980s. The length of time spent unemployed has increased and the trend towards early retirement has intensified. New legal action aims at lowering the costs of this development for the social security system. The increased participation of the partners of collective bargaining in the problem solving process aims at a more even distribution of costs incurred, as well as at a reduction of unemployment. Action taken and agreements reached tend to restrict themselves to a limited span of time, to the foreseeable future. They influence the situation of the unemployed and prematurely retired older workers in positive as well as in negative ways.