More than twice as many men work beyond the national pension age compared to women in Denmark, according to analysis by Forsikring & Pension (F&P).

The association found that if women worked beyond the national pension age to the same extent as men, employment would increase by 22,000 full-time workers.

It called for greater focus on how women older than the national pension age in Denmark could be helped in retaining their jobs.

F&P noted that older employees had been responsible for a large part of the increased employment in Denmark in recent years.

However, there is a large difference in between the genders, with 10.5 per cent of men over the national pension age working, compared to 4.5 per cent of women in the same age cohort.

Over the past 12 years, employment amongst seniors has increased “significantly”, according to F&P, because both the early retirement age and the state pension age have been set.

This has meant that both men and women have, on average, been withdrawing later from the labour market.

However, women retire an average of 1.5 years earlier than men, a trend that has been found across sectors and industries.

“There is a huge difference in how many women and men work after the national pension age,” commented F&P CEO, Kent Damsgaard.

“There are twice as many men who stay in the job. Both women and men withdraw from the labour market later and later, but women do it a full 1.5 years before men.

“The difference goes across industries and also means that there is a big difference in the scope of work after the state pension age.

“Our calculations show that if you imagine women worked as much as men after the national pension age, it would increase employment by 22,000 full-time workers.

“It would be a huge boost to many of the private and public work areas where we lack labour now and in the years to come.”

Damsgaard called for both politicians and employers to focus on how experienced women could be retained in the workforce, noting that there was potential for society to do better at retaining older female workers and there was a shortage of skilled workers in Denmark.

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