Dissertation_Paula Aleksandrowicz_12 ... - Jacobs University
Dissertation_Paula Aleksandrowicz_12 ... - Jacobs University
Dissertation_Paula Aleksandrowicz_12 ... - Jacobs University
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innovative ideas of work-life balance spread at firm level and allow them for meeting their<br />
labour/leisure expectations at the same time. Scholars have since long voted in favour of a<br />
simultaneous – instead of subsequent – structuring of life phases (Deller et al. 2008: 142ff).<br />
In a situation of value change in Western industrialised nations when the importance of<br />
duty, on the one hand, and the opportunity to pursue one´s personal interest, on the other<br />
hand, as drivers for work motivation is reshuffled (Kühnlein/Böhle 2002: 96), this<br />
recommendation is valid even more.<br />
As regards pull factors, a chance to prolong working lives rests in the fact that<br />
institutional changes, which aim in the direction of cutting existing early exit patterns and<br />
imposing malus rules on those who nevertheless want to exit early, are beginning to show<br />
effect on both the actual behaviour of individuals and on their preferences. However, the<br />
impact is more visible in the case of Germany as respective reform elements have come into<br />
force at an earlier time.<br />
However, even then, structural factors have determining power. In times of tight labour<br />
markets (which have been, after a first one-year long recovery, put under more pressure<br />
after the stock-market crash in late 2008), firms will still make decisions in the realm of<br />
employee exit policy to the detriment of older workers, and the workers concerned will<br />
accede to it for reasons of peer pressure and the preference for the status of early retiree<br />
instead of being unemployed (Naschold et al. 1994b: 153). Especially in Poland, as the firm<br />
case studies have shown, workers are willing to accept a lower pension level in order to<br />
escape the risk of unemployment and for reasons of peer pressure.<br />
The gender-specific exit preferences which are shaped both endogenously and<br />
exogenously also hinder the prolongation of working life. In opinion surveys, women in<br />
both countries have opted for a lower retirement age than men (Zgierska 2007: 7; Engstler<br />
2004: 13); the differences between the sexes are higher in Poland. My establishment-level<br />
studies have revealed that there is a collusion of interests in Poland to use early retirement<br />
for women as a vehicle for early exit e.g. in times of restructuring. This is reflected at<br />
aggregate level in an average exit age of Polish women which is four years lower than that<br />
of German women and of Polish men (Eurostat data from 2007). Those cross-national<br />
differences can be explained with social norms related to gender and family. In Germany,<br />
the dominant cultural model of family is “male breadwinner/female part-time carer model”,<br />
which is reflected in a high share of female part-time workers caring for children. In<br />
Poland, childcare is to a great degree facilitated by involving grandparents – the dominant<br />
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