Well-being and intended early retirement among older European workers: does job satisfaction matter? A 6-Wave follow-up

In recent years, population aging has received great attention in developed countries given the social challenges that it entails. At this regard, it is well documented that this collective is associated with fewer resources (both physical and economic). Furthermore, ageing societies incite an increase in the inactive population and so, threaten the financial viability of the social protection systems. This study investigates the effects of different factors on early retirement intentions among European workers aged 50-65 using the latest available data (waves 1-6: 2004-2015) from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE). We shed new light on this causal relationship controlling for job characteristics and well-being indicators. Our empirical results based on logistics regressions suggest that people that is satisfied with their jobs (OR = 0.61; 95 % C.I. 0.53, 0.71), with very high appreciation of their quality of life (OR = 0.56; 95 % C.I. 0.49, 0.64) or with good health (OR = 0.55; 95 % C.I. 0.47, 0.65) would have less intentions of early retirement, that is, decreased odds of work exit. Besides, social-environment would matter.