EXTEND: Social inequalities in extending working lives of an ageing workforce

欧洲目前正在经历重大的人口结构变化，人口老龄化，劳动力减少，预期寿命延长。在这方面，有必要以一种对工人、雇主和整个国家都是健康和富有成效的方式提高老年工人的活动率。延长工作年限的一个主要问题是，处于不同情况的人将受到任何拟议变化的不同影响。EXTEND是一个跨国合作项目，因此旨在审查与延长工作寿命有关的不平等现象。它涉及与一些相关问题有关的不平等问题，包括退休和养恤金政策的变化、老年工人和退休人员的健康和福祉、工作场所因素、雇员技能和培训以及监管和立法框架。由于保健和护理专业人员所面临的障碍，该项目将把社会服务部门作为一个特别重要的例子。证据基础将通过利用其在五个欧盟国家的合作伙伴的不同专业知识，采用一系列定量和定性方法，包括政策分析、小组数据方法、自然实验、实地试验、案例研究、访谈和焦点小组来生成。我们将让众多利益攸关方参与我们的调查结果，包括政策制定者、商界、工人及其代表、老年人、公众和社会服务部门的从业人员。EXTEND项目在很大程度上是由解决方案驱动的，总体目标是减少退休结构中的不平等。

Europe is currently undergoing significant demographic change, with an ageing population, shrinking workforce, and increasing life expectancy. In this context, it is necessary to raise the activity rate of older workers in a way that is healthy and productive for workers, employers and countries as a whole. A major issue in extending working lives is that those in different circumstances will be affected differentially by any proposed changes. EXTEND is a cross-national collaborative project which therefore aims to examine inequalities in relation to extending working lives. It addresses inequalities in relation to a number of pertinent issues, including changes to retirement and pension policies, the health and well-being of older workers and retirees, workplace factors, employee skills and training, and regulative and legislative frameworks. The project will take the social services sector as a particularly important example due to the barriers faced by health and care professionals. The evidence base will be generated by drawing on the varied expertise of its partners across five EU countries, employing a range of quantitative and qualitative methods, including policy analysis, panel data methods, natural experiments, a field trial, case studies, interviews and focus groups. We will engage numerous stakeholders with our findings, including policy makers, the business community, workers and their representatives, older people, the general public, and practitioners in the social services sector. The EXTEND project is strongly solution-driven, and has the overall aim of reducing inequalities in retirement structures.