A critique of "productivist" policy responses to population ageing focusing on financial outcomes in retirement for women

Margaret Moussa, Suzanne Wagland

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Focusing on financial outcomes in retirement for women, this paper critically examines the suite of “productivist” policies proposed by leading regional and global policy institutions as a solution to what they perceive as a potential population ageing crisis. Specifically, the paper challenges the claim that this suite of policies constitutes a virtuous system. Taking the life course timing of women’s paid and unpaid work, we successively integrate the likely key consequences of “productivist ageing” policy in a series of retirement income scenarios. The series culminates in a situation where a mother twice enters and leaves paid employment to provide respectively child care and elder care. Rather than illustrating a sustainable system, our results indicate a viscous, intergenerational cycle in which impoverished caregivers are in turn forced to rely on the unpaid care of their adult daughters.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)453-473
Number of pages21
JournalJournal of Population Ageing
Volume12
Publication statusPublished - 2020

Keywords

  • population ageing
  • pensions
  • retirement
  • government policy
  • women

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