Almost half of those who retired at Ilmarinen between 2021 and 2024 retired after their lowest retirement age, data from Finnish earnings-related pension provider Ilmarinen has found, indicating an increase in Finns continuing to work past retirement age.

Ilmarinen's Working Life Index suggested that postponing retirement is not only common in expert fields as previously thought but also in many other sectors.

The data showed that of the employees insured by Ilmarinen, in 2021–2024, employees in the professional services and information technology and communications sectors were the most likely to postpone retirement. Many employees in these sectors are in professional occupations.

However, in labour-intensive sectors, such as administrative and support services and health and social services, the research found that retirement deferrals are almost as common, with retirement being almost as late as it is in the information technology and communications sector.

Despite 84 per cent of administrative and support services doing manual work, 38 per cent continue working for six months after the lowest retirement age and as many as 8 per cent after two years.

Ilmarinen's insurance and pensions senior vice president, Tiina Nurmi, explained that there are several incentives in the Finnish pension system that aim to extend working careers.

“After the lowest old-age pension age, new pension accrues for work and the employee receives an increment for deferred retirement of 0.4 per cent for each month of deferral, which permanently increases the amount of the pension,” she continued.

“Employers also often encourage older people to continue working by offering flexible working hours, for example. It is great to see from the statistics that the incentives work and that people continue working for such a long time after their lowest retirement age."

Additionally, the provider’s Career Index revealed that the oldest employees are in the physically demanding and male-dominated transport and industrial sectors.
In the transport sector, 13 per cent are aged 60 or over and will retire in the next few years, while in manufacturing 10 per cent are over 60.

The number of individuals over 60 is the lowest in the accommodation and food service sector at around 5 per cent.

The data suggested that by the end of the year, people working in the transport and manufacturing sectors will retire earlier than people in other jobs.

Between 2021 and 2024, 31 per cent of retired transport workers and 34 per cent of retired manufacturing workers worked for more than six months after they reached the earliest age they were allowed to retire. The corresponding figure for professional services was 47 per cent.

When Ilmarinen’s 2024 Disability Pension Index statistics are combined with the data of the Working Life Index, the transport sector and manufacturing sector are at risk of not only old-age pensions but also disability pensions.

In transport and manufacturing, the start of disability pensions is three to four times higher than in expert services, and the main cause of disability is musculoskeletal diseases.

Ilmarinen chief specialist, Anssi Smedlund, commented: “It is worrying that sectors where employees are the oldest also suffer the most from disability.

“Work in these sectors should be more flexible according to the coping and fitness of the employees so that the person could continue working even when they are older if they so wish.”

Ilmarinen's Career Index is the third of Ilmarinen's indices, along with the Business Cycle Index and the Disability Pension Index.

---