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    An Uptick in Elder Poverty: A Blip, or a Sign of Things to Come?

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    In the 1960s, more than a third of older Americans lived in poverty. With the aid of federal programs like Medicare to help the elderly, the situation improved significantly. But last year, the poverty rate for those 65 or older increased, even as it sank for everyone else.The uptick offers new evidence that elderly people haven’t fared as well as younger generations in recent years, and some experts worry that it may signal a broader setback in the financial security of those past their prime working years.While 9.5 percent of the elderly population lived in poverty in 2020, that figure rose to 10.7 percent last year, the Census Bureau reported. The coronavirus pandemic was a central driver, disproportionately disrupting the employment and income of older people.They usually weren’t eligible for as much pandemic relief as families with children. And older workers left the labor force at higher rates than others as Covid-19 spread, and can have difficulty returning.That’s the situation that Walter Cox, 64, may find himself in. As an automotive technician at a car dealership in Tulsa, Okla., he never made more than $9.50 an hour, and wasn’t able to save money while raising two children. Nevertheless, he retired in 2020, as the physical labor — and rude customers — took a toll. He also got married, and he and his wife had about $2,000 in combined monthly income for most of 2021, which made for a comfortable if modest living.But when his wife had to leave for New Mexico to take care of her mother, the couple divorced, leaving Mr. Cox with a $765 Social Security check to cover all of his bills. That will leave him below the official poverty threshold of $12,996 for a person 65 or older living alone. He has been mowing yards for some extra income, but can’t do anything he had imagined doing in retirement, like a road trip to Yellowstone National Park.“I literally cannot afford to do anything but put gas in my car, buy groceries and pay my utility bills,” Mr. Cox said. “Because of the divorce, it’s looking pretty grim. But I’m hopeful that things improve.”For many older Americans, an inflation adjustment to Social Security payments — an 8.7 percent increase for 2023 was announced last week — will help next year. But people hitting retirement today often depend on Social Security as their only source of income, which wasn’t the program’s original intention.Poverty Rates by Age GroupIn 2021, even as the poverty rate sank for everyone else, it increased among seniors — rising above younger age groups for the first time in 15 years.

    Source: Census Bureau and Columbia Center on Poverty and Social PolicyBy The New York TimesOlder workers’ wages have grown more slowly compared with other groups over the past few years, and many didn’t have 401(k) accounts, or didn’t contribute enough to them, as companies closed their defined-benefit pension plans over the last couple of decades.“We’re getting more and more older people who lived through this experiment with do-it-yourself pensions, and they’re coming into this age group without the same kind of incomes that older people have,” said Teresa Ghilarducci, an economics professor at the New School who specializes in retirement policy. “I don’t think it’s a blip.”More on Social Security and RetirementMedicare Costs: Low-income Americans on Medicare can get assistance paying their premiums and other expenses. This is how to apply.Downsizing in Retirement: People selling their homes often have to shell out more to spend less. Here’s what to consider.Claiming Social Security: Looking to make the most of this benefit? These online tools can help you figure out your income needs and when to file.Even though the share of elderly people officially below the poverty line is low by historical standards in the United States, it remains among the highest in the developed world, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. The average poverty rate for older Americans also masks far higher shares among more vulnerable groups, with nearly one in five Black and Hispanic women 65 or older falling below the official poverty threshold in 2021. It’s higher for single people, too — a reality forced on hundreds of thousands of older Americans whose spouses died of Covid-19.The poverty rate is also not a bright line when it comes to financial hardship. It doesn’t take into account debt, which more seniors have accumulated since the Great Recession. Moreover, nearly one in four people 65 or older make less than 150 percent of the federal poverty line, or $19,494 on average for those living alone. Another measure, developed by the Gerontology Institute at the University of Massachusetts Boston and called the Elder Index, finds that it takes $22,476 for a single older person in good health with no mortgage to cover basic needs, with the cost escalating for renters and those with health problems.“To some extent we’re splitting hairs when we talk about people who fall just above and just below, because they’re all struggling,” said Jan Mutchler, a demographer at the University of Massachusetts at Boston who helped devise the Elder Index. “The assumptions that go into what we’re calling hardship are just flawed.”That’s true for Juanita Brown, 77, who lives on her own in Galax, a small town in Virginia’s Blue Ridge Mountains. A farmer’s daughter, she worked as a nanny, and then a certified nursing assistant, and then a preschool teacher. Her husband worked in the local textile industry, and after raising two children, they had built a substantial nest egg.But then Ms. Brown’s mother developed Alzheimer’s disease and couldn’t support herself. Ms. Brown stopped working to take care of her, which cost another $500 per month in expenses. Her husband got prostate cancer, which required extended trips to the hospital in Winston-Salem, N.C.“That depleted us,” Ms. Brown said. After her husband died in 2019, she was left with a car payment and more bills that went unpaid during his illness. She took out another mortgage on her home to help cover them, along with the $1,465 she gets from Social Security on the fourth Wednesday of every month.Family photos on display in Ms. Brown’s home in Galax, Va.“When you sit down and look at your income, and what you got to pay for every month, you got to cut corners,” Ms. Brown said.That technically puts her above the poverty line. But that hasn’t left enough money to replace the dentures she lost three years ago, or to replenish her heating oil, which now costs up to $250 a tank. She uses her wood stove as much as she can, but it gets too cold at night, which aggravates her arthritis. She records every expense in a little booklet.“When you sit down and look at your income, and what you got to pay for every month, you got to cut corners,” Ms. Brown said. Sometimes, one of her sons will visit and leave her with $50, even though she knows they can’t afford it either.Many times before, Ms. Brown has leaned on the support of District Three Governmental Cooperative, a local agency that provides transportation, help navigating government benefits, opportunities to socialize and other services for older residents. Debbie Spencer, the agency’s director of aging and disability services, has seen more clients struggle over the last year to pay for groceries. Covid-19 also made it more difficult to reach her more isolated clients, who often lack internet connections.“We’re seeing people who don’t know whether to pay their utility bills, to buy food, or to buy medicine,” Ms. Spencer said. “They’re having to make decisions about what they’re going to do. We helped people last year, but we see more and more people calling us this year for help.”The agency also runs a training program for older workers, popular with people who’ve found their Social Security income inadequate to live on.To prevent the poverty rate from rising further, advocates for the elderly recommend three types of actions: shoring up employer-sponsored retirement programs, helping older people earn more by working longer if they need to, and basing eligibility for public benefits on a more realistic definition of economic hardship.In 2022, the Labor Department reported that while 72 percent of civilian workers had access to an employer-sponsored retirement plan, only about 56 percent took part in one. That, in part, is why the lowest one-fifth of the income distribution in households headed by seniors gets 80 percent of its income from Social Security.For those retiring today who do have a 401(k), a swooning stock market is forcing them to recalibrate what income they can expect going forward. And the millennial generation is likely to retire less prepared than its predecessors, because of higher loads of student debt.Those without adequate retirement savings often have to keep working late into their 60s and 70s. Emily Allen, interim president of the AARP Foundation, says too many seniors overestimate their ability to take a break — or are pushed out of jobs — and end up in a difficult situation.Becky Freeman, an employee of District Three Governmental Cooperative, a local agency that provides services to seniors, made a home delivery in Meadowview, Va.Ms. Freeman, right, reviewing bills with Mildred Sneed during a home visit.“Older workers who stepped away and want to get back into the work force often have to take jobs at a lower wage than they earned in the past,” Ms. Allen said. “It’s easier to get a job when you have a job. So often we encourage individuals just to get back into the work force, but then work to advance their skills.”To supplement low wages, the American Rescue Plan of 2021 temporarily made people over 65 eligible for the earned-income tax credit, for which they otherwise don’t qualify. Advocates for the elderly have pushed to make that change permanent, since the wage supplement is often enough to lift people out of poverty.Older people low on financial resources can also look forward to the drug pricing provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act, which will reduce the cost of medications in the coming years and provide subsidies for those living close to the poverty line.Meanwhile, though, most aid programs that had been created or strengthened in 2020 and 2021 are gone. Gail Gorlen, 77, started leaning more on her credit card after the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program went from sending her $170 each month — an amount increased during the pandemic — to $115. She feels lucky to have found an apartment in a subsidized senior housing complex in Joplin, Mo., when she and her longtime partner split up last year, and is hoping that her Medicare Advantage program will provide some extra help with food.But for now, even cooking all her food at home, the days before her benefit card arrives on the 20th of the month are stressful.“I’ve gotten to the point where I can only pay a percentage of my Visa — I can’t pay the whole thing off, I don’t have enough money in the month,” Ms. Gorlen said. “I keep charging, charging, charging.” More

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    U.K. Government Plans an Update to Its Tax and Spending Agenda

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    After an earlier announcement sent markets into a tailspin, the prime minister and the chancellor are under pressure to restore fiscal credibility.After days of confusion, Britain’s government said on Monday that the date for its next fiscal policy announcement would be moved up nearly a month and that it would provide, at the same time, a much-anticipated independent assessment of the policies’ impact on the nation’s economy and public finances.The chancellor of the Exchequer, Kwasi Kwarteng, said he would publish his “medium-term fiscal plan” on Oct. 31, which would show how the government, under the new prime minister, Liz Truss, would bring down debt levels despite large spending plans and tax cuts that would be funded by borrowing.New economic and fiscal forecasts from the Office for Budget Responsibility, a government watchdog, are to be published the same day.The move is aimed to reassure financial markets and the public of the new government’s fiscal credibility. Its first major economic announcement, a speech by Mr. Kwarteng on Sept. 23, was dominated by unfunded tax cuts at a time of high inflation, and it quickly sent markets into a tailspin: The British pound hit a record low against the dollar, and turmoil in the bond market led to higher mortgage rates and intervention from the Bank of England to protect pension funds.Since then, the government has canceled its plan to abolish the top income tax rate for the highest earners — the most surprising tax-cutting measure announced last month — and tried to restore its fiscal credibility, while maintaining its commitment to an agenda of using tax cuts and deregulation to speed economic growth.Rising Inflation in BritainInflation Slows Slightly: Consumer prices are still rising at about the fastest pace in 40 years, despite a small drop to 9.9 percent in August.Interest Rates: On Sept. 22, the Bank of England raised its key rate by another half a percentage point, to 2.25 percent, as it tries to keep high inflation from becoming embedded in the nation’s economy.Truss’s Experiment Stumbles: Prime Minister Liz Truss says a mix of tax cuts and deregulation is needed to jump-start Britain’s sluggish economy. Investors, economists and some in her own party disagree.Mortgage Market: The uptick in interest rates roiled Britain’s mortgage market, leaving many homeowners calculating their potential future mortgage payments with alarm.Part of this rehabilitation effort included a promise to publish a more detailed fiscal plan focused on reducing debt and provide an independent analysis by the Office for Budget Responsibility. But the date was set for Nov. 23 — too long to wait, said fellow Conservative Party members, opposition lawmakers and investors.Liz Truss, the prime minister, with Mr. Kwarteng visiting a construction site last week. Pool photo by Stefan RousseauLast week, it was widely reported that the date would be moved forward, and Mr. Kwarteng denied this. On Monday, he confirmed that the announcement would indeed arrive on Oct. 31.Two weeks ago, in the immediate aftermath of Mr. Kwarteng’s policy speech, the pound plummeted to $1.035 and speculation grew that it could reach parity with the dollar. The cancellation of the top tax rate cut, which the government argued had become a distraction from its overall growth plan, helped the currency rebound a bit.But that recovery has stalled. On Monday, the pound was trading around $1.10 amid skepticism that the government’s plan would expand the economy as promised, and that instead large public spending cuts would be necessary.Fitch Ratings said on Monday that it expected the British economy to contract 1 percent next year, after “extreme volatility” in British financial markets and the prospect of “sharply higher” interest rates. Last month, it forecast a 0.2 percent decline for next year.“Rising funding costs, tighter financing conditions, including for mortgage borrowers, and increased uncertainty will outweigh the impact of looser fiscal policy” next year, analysts at the ratings agency wrote. They expect Britain’s economy to enter a recession in this quarter. The agency has already changed its ratings outlook for Britain to negative.That was just one of many rebukes of the government’s plans. For example, the International Monetary Fund encouraged the government to re-evaluate the tax cuts, which it said would increase inequality.But Ms. Truss, seeking to reverse years of sluggish growth and weak productivity, has been clear that she wants to run the economy differently than her predecessors. One early decision was to fire the top civil servant in the Treasury, Tom Scholar, a move that rattled some analysts. On Monday, the government announced his successor, James Bowler, who will transfer from the international trade department but spent two decades at the Treasury previously.Even as the government makes conciliatory moves, there are signs of distress in financial markets. On Monday, the Bank of England said it would expand its intervention in the bond market. The bank will increase the size of the daily auctions in a bond-buying program that was set up to support pensions funds, after tumult in this market threatened Britain’s financial stability.Over the last eight trading days, the bank bought only about 5 billion pounds of long-dated government bonds in total, despite setting a limit of £5 billion a day. With markets wondering what will happen when the bond-buying operation ends on Friday, the central bank announced that it would expand its support. As well as increasing the auction sizes, it will set up a new collateral facility to try to ease liquidity problems faced by the pension funds. That facility will continue beyond this week.The announcement appeared to do little to ease the markets. On Monday, Britain’s bond prices kept falling, while the yield on 30-year bonds rose to 4.72 percent, once again approaching highs seen during the worst of the bond rout after the last fiscal statement.The financial district in London. The new government’s first major economic announcement, on Sept. 23, quickly sent markets into a tailspin.Alex Ingram for The New York Times More

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    How the Pandemic Has Added to Labor Unrest

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    While big companies wield considerable power, Covid’s economic disruption has given workers new leverage, contributing to a recent upturn in strikes.When 420 workers at the Heaven Hill spirits bottling plant near Louisville went on strike in September, they were frustrated that the company’s proposed contract could reduce their overtime pay. Many had earned extra income working seven days a week during the pandemic.“We were essential,” said Leslie Glazar, recording secretary of the local union representing spirits workers. “They kept preaching, ‘You get us through that, we’ll make it worth your time.’ But we went from heroes to zero.”The recent strike at Heaven Hill, which ended in late October after the company softened its overtime proposal, appears to reflect the current moment: Buoyed by shortages in labor and supplies that leave employers more vulnerable, and frustrated by what they see as unfair treatment during the pandemic, workers are standing up for a better deal.Data collected by the School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University shows the number of workers on strike increased in October, to more than 25,000, versus an average of around 10,000 in the previous three months.“Labor market leverage and the fact that workers have been through incredibly difficult working conditions over the past year and a half with the pandemic are combining to explain a lot of this labor activism now,” said Johnnie Kallas, a Ph.D. student and the project director of Cornell’s Labor Action Tracker.Large companies continue to have considerable power, and it is not clear that the recent job actions point to a new era of widespread strikes. Many workers who were nearing a strike appear to have pulled back from the brink, including 60,000 film and television production workers, whose strike threat was at least temporarily defused when their union reached tentative agreements with production studios. And even a doubling or tripling of strike activity would fall well below levels common in the 1960s and 70s.But the fitful economic recovery from the pandemic has eroded management’s advantages. Employers are having unusual difficulty in filling jobs — this summer, the Labor Department recorded the highest number of job openings since it began keeping such data in 2000. And for some companies, supply-chain disruptions have taken a toll on the bottom line.In a recent survey by IPC, a trade association representing the electronics industry, nine out of 10 manufacturers complained that the time it takes to make their goods had increased. Nearly one-third reported delays of eight weeks or more.Workers at Kellogg in Battle Creek, Mich., have been on strike since early October.Nicole Hester/The Grand Rapids Press, via Associated PressMany workers also contend that their employers have failed to share enormous pandemic-era profits, even as they sometimes risked their lives to make those earnings possible. Striking workers at John Deere, whose union announced a tentative agreement with the company over the weekend, have pointed out that Deere is on pace to set a record profit of nearly $6 billion this fiscal year even as it sought to end traditional pensions for new hires. The United Automobile Workers said a vote on the contract was expected this week.Workers say that when companies do offer raises, the increases are often limited and don’t make up for the weakening of benefits that they have endured for years.That helps explain why the upturn in labor action dates back to 2018, when tens of thousands of teachers walked off the job in states like West Virginia and Arizona, though the lockdowns and layoffs of the pandemic initially suppressed strike activity. With workers in both Democratic and Republican states feeling wronged, the strike impulse tends to transcend partisan divides.One increasingly common complaint is the so-called two-tier compensation structure, in which workers hired before a certain date may earn a higher wage or a traditional pension, while more recent hires have a lower maximum wage or receive most of their retirement benefits through a variable plan like a 401(k).Frustration with the two-tier system helped propel a six-week strike at General Motors in 2019, and has loomed over several strikes this year, including Kellogg and Deere. Deere workers hired after 1997 have much smaller traditional pensions.In some cases, workers have even grown skeptical of their union leadership, worrying that negotiators have become too remote from the concerns of the rank and file.This is particularly true at the United Automobile Workers, which has been wracked by a corruption scandal in which more than 15 people have been convicted, including two recent presidents. Some Deere workers cited discontent with their union’s leadership in explaining their vote against the initial contract the union had negotiated.It is also a feeling that some Hollywood crew members have expressed about negotiations handled by their union, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees. “They’re not bad people, they’re working in good faith,” said Victor P. Bouzi, a sound mixer and IATSE member based in Southern California. “But they’re not seeing what’s happening to people and how we’re getting squeezed down here.”The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees prepared for a strike before negotiators reached tentative agreements with film and television studios.Jenna Schoenefeld for The New York TimesYet for every force pushing workers toward a strike, there are others that push in the other direction.Union leaders can be reluctant to strike after having negotiated a deal for workers. IATSE leaders are endorsing the tentative agreements they reached with the studios in October, and even those who oppose them believe it will be a long shot for the membership to vote them down.Matthew Loeb, the IATSE president, said that 36 locals were closely involved in developing the union’s bargaining objectives and that “our members demonstrated incredible union solidarity that stunned the employers and helped us to achieve our stated goals.”For their part, companies often pre-empt a labor action by improving compensation, something that appears to be happening as employers raise wages, though that is also to attract new workers. (It’s less clear if the wage increases are keeping up with inflation outside leisure and hospitality industries.)Manufacturing workers contemplating strikes may have jobs that are relatively sought-after in their cities and towns, making workers less keen to risk their jobs in the event of a strike, and potentially easier to fill than a quick glance at the number of local openings would suggest.And the mere act of striking can exert an enormous psychological and financial toll in an economy where workers have a limited safety net. When unionized workers receive strike pay, it’s typically a fraction of their usual pay, and they must often picket outside their workplace to receive it.Companies can use the legal system to place restrictions on them — as with Warrior Met Coal in Alabama, where about 1,000 workers represented by the United Mine Workers of America have been on strike for seven months. The company recently won a court order prohibiting picketing within 300 yards of entrances..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-1kpebx{margin:0 auto;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-1kpebx{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.625rem;}@media (min-width:740px){#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-1kpebx{font-size:1.6875rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1kpebx{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-1gtxqqv{margin-bottom:0;}.css-1g3vlj0{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1g3vlj0{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-1g3vlj0 strong{font-weight:600;}.css-1g3vlj0 em{font-style:italic;}.css-1g3vlj0{margin-bottom:0;margin-top:0.25rem;}.css-19zsuqr{display:block;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}.css-12vbvwq{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-qjk116{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-qjk116 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-qjk116 em{font-style:italic;}.css-qjk116 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:visited{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}As difficult as a strike can be when workers are unionized, it is far more difficult when they’re not. Nonunionized workers often find strikes harder to organize and harder to endure because of the lack of pay. They are typically more vulnerable to potentially unlawful responses by employers, which unions have the legal muscle to resist.It is perhaps no surprise that as the rate of union membership has fallen, so has the number of strikes. Until the early 1980s, the country typically saw more than 200 a year involving 1,000 or more workers, versus 25 in 2019, the highest in almost two decades. Far fewer than 20 began this year.Striking workers outside a John Deere plant near Des Moines. The company’s pension system has been an issue in the strike.Kelsey Kremer/The Des Moines Register, via Associated Press“The volume is quite minimal,” said Ruth Milkman, a sociologist of labor at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. “That’s partly because only 6 percent of the private sector is organized.”The recent strike at Heaven Hill in Bardstown, Ky., illustrates the complicated calculus facing workers. An analysis by the employment site ZipRecruiter showed that when the strike vote was taken in September, job postings in the Louisville area had increased by almost twice the percentage they had nationwide during the pandemic.After the company threatened to bring in replacement workers, the employees were dismissive. “No one can find workers now — where do they think they’ll find 400?” Ms. Glazar, the local union official, said shortly before the strike ended. “That’s the only thing that keeps us smiling out there.”There were also indications that Heaven Hill was running low on inventory as the strike wore on, crimping the company’s ability to age and bottle alcohol that it produced in Louisville. “We could see the truck movement had slowed down from week one to week six — there were not near as many trucks in and out,” Ms. Glazar said.Josh Hafer, a company spokesman, said, “There may have been some small-scale products impacted, but not to any large degree.”Still, the workers were under enormous stress. Their health benefits ended when their contract expired, and some workers found their insurance was no longer valid while trying to squeeze in a final doctor’s appointment.And while jobs in the area appeared plentiful, many workers preferred to stay in the whiskey-making business. “I like what I do, I enjoy everything about bourbon,” said Austin Hinshaw, a worker who voted to strike at the Heaven Hill plant. “I have worked at a factory before, and it’s not my thing.” In late October, Mr. Hinshaw accepted a job at a distillery in town where he had been applying for months.A few days earlier, Heaven Hill management had worked out a new agreement with the union. The proposed contract included a commitment to largely maintain the existing overtime pay rules for current workers, though it left open the possibility that future workers would be scheduled on weekends at regular pay, which grated on union members. The company also offered a slightly larger pay increase than it had offered just before the workers’ contract expired in September.In a statement, Heaven Hill pointed to the generous health benefits and increased wages and vacation time in the new contract.The company’s proposal divided the members, many of whom wanted to keep fighting, but more than one-third voted in favor of the contract, the minimum needed to approve it and end the strike.“There are a lot of mixed emotions,” Ms. Glazar said. “Some of them are just disappointed. They thought that it would have been better.”Peter S. Goodman More

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    A Graying China May Have to Put Off Retirement. Workers Aren’t Happy.

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    Most Chinese workers retire by 60. But with the population aging and pension funds running low, the government says that must change.For Meng Shan, a 48-year-old urban management worker in the Chinese city of Nanchang, retirement can’t come soon enough.Mr. Meng, who is the equivalent of a low-level, unarmed law-enforcement official, often has to chase down unlicensed street vendors, a task he finds physically and emotionally taxing. Pay is low. Retirement, even on a meager government pension, would finally offer a break.So Mr. Meng was dismayed when the Chinese government said it would raise the mandatory retirement age, which is currently 60 for men. He wondered how much longer his body could handle the work, and whether his employer would dump him before he became eligible for a pension.“To tell the truth,” he said of the government’s announcement, “this is extremely unfriendly to us low-level workers.”China said last month that it would “gradually delay the legal retirement age” over the next five years, in an attempt to address one of the country’s most pressing issues. Its rapidly aging population means a shrinking labor force. State pension funds are at risk of running out. And China has some of the lowest retirement ages in the world: 50 for blue-collar female workers, 55 for white-collar female workers, and 60 for most men.The idea, though, is deeply unpopular. The government has yet to release details of its plan, but older workers have already decried being cheated of their promised timelines, while young people worry that competition for jobs, already fierce, will intensify.And workers with blue-collar or physically demanding jobs like Mr. Meng’s, who still make up the majority of China’s labor force, say they’ll be worn down, left unemployed or both.The announcement was made during the annual meeting of the national legislature, and afterward retirement-related topics trended for days on Chinese social media, racking up hundreds of millions of views and critical comments.Census workers in the Chinese region of Tibet in October. China’s population is aging rapidly.Roman Pilipey/EPA, via ShutterstockAround the world, raising the retirement age has emerged as one of the thorniest challenges a government can take on. Russia’s attempt to do so in 2018 led to President Vladimir V. Putin’s lowest approval ratings in years. Mr. Putin eventually pushed the plan through but granted concessions, a rare move for him.A pension reform plan in France prompted a prolonged transportation strike last year, forcing the government to shelve the proposal.The Chinese government itself abandoned a previous effort to raise retirement ages in 2015, in the face of a similar outcry.This time, it seems determined to follow through. But it has also acknowledged the backlash. Officials appear to be treading gingerly, leaving the details vague for now but suggesting that the threshold would be raised by just a few months each year.“They’ve been talking about it for a long time,” said Albert Francis Park, an economics professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology who has studied China’s retirement system. “They’ll have to really exercise quite a bit of resolve to push it through.”China has been hurtling toward a retirement age crisis for years. The current standards were set in the 1950s, when the average citizen was expected to live until only his or her early 40s.But as the country has swiftly modernized, life expectancy has reached nearly 77 years, according to World Bank data. Birthrates have also plummeted, leaving China’s population distinctly top-heavy. More than 300 million people, about one-fifth of the population, are expected to be over 60 by 2025, according to the government.Most Chinese families depend on grandparents for child care. A later retirement age could complicate such arrangements.Wang Zhao/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe result is what experts call a serious threat to China’s continued economic growth and ability to compete. In Japan and many European nations, residents become eligible for pensions at 65 or later. At a recent news conference, You Jun, the deputy minister of human resources and social security, said China risked a “waste of human resources.”The backlash has underscored a host of other anxieties in Chinese society about issues such as job security, the social safety net and income inequality.The hypercompetitive environment that defines many white-collar workplaces in China is already grinding on Naomi Chen, a 29-year-old financial analyst in Shanghai. She has often discussed with friends her wish to retire early to escape the pressure, even if it means living more modestly.The government’s announcement only confirmed that desire. China already struggles to provide enough well-paid white-collar jobs for its ballooning ranks of university graduates. With fewer retirees, Ms. Chen worries, she would be left working just as hard but with less prospect of a payoff.“Getting promoted will definitely be slower, because the people above me won’t retire,” she said.In reality, older workers may suffer more. China has modernized so quickly that they tend to be much less skilled or educated than their younger counterparts, making some employers reluctant to retain them, Professor Park said. In several industries, including tech, 35 is seen as the age ceiling for being hired.Some young workers in China fear that pushing back the retirement age will have repercussions for them, and not just in the long term.Gilles Sabrié for The New York TimesDelaying retirement also risks undermining another major government priority: encouraging couples to have more children, to slow the aging of the population.In part because of inadequate child-care resources, the vast majority of Chinese rely on grandparents to be the primary caretakers for their children. Now, social media users are asking what will happen if the older generation is still working.Lu Xia, 26, said the prospect of later retirement made it impossible to consider having a second child. More children would eventually mean more grandchildren to care for, even as she was expected to keep working.“With delayed retirement, it’s hard to imagine what we’ll have to face by the time that we are grandparents,” said Ms. Lu, who lives in the city of Yangquan, southwest of Beijing.Unless China increases support for child care, new parents may leave the work force or postpone childbirth until their parents retire, exacerbating the labor shortage, Feng Jin, an economist at Fudan University, told a state-backed labor publication.Still, experts maintain that the cost of inaction would be too high. A 2019 report by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences predicted that the country’s main pension fund would run out by 2035, in part because of the dwindling work force.A clothing factory in Jiangsu Province. Chinese officials have suggested that retirement ages would be raised gradually, by a few months per year.Chinatopix, via Associated PressThat has alarmed some young people, who wonder where their own pensions will come from if nothing changes.“I think this is pretty fair,” Wang Guohua, a 29-year-old blogger in Hebei Province, said of pushing back retirement ages. “If people are still alive but there’s no more money, that will affect social stability.”Mr. Wang added that he did not see the appeal of retiring at 60, given how much life expectancy had increased: “You won’t have anything to do.”Indeed, Bian Jianfu, who retired recently from his job as a manager at a state-owned enterprise in Sichuan Province, said he would not have minded working a few years longer. His pension would have increased, too.Mr. Bian receives about $1,000 a month, more than double the average for urban retirees. He praised the government for consistently raising pension payments over the past decade though some experts have acknowledged the strain that doing so has added to the system. “The Chinese government treats retirees very well,” he said.But that security is unevenly distributed, and it is likely to remain so even if the government shores up its pension funds.Mr. Meng, the urban management worker, is paid about $460 a month, one-tenth of which he pays toward pension and basic medical insurance funds. When he finally retires, he expects to draw $120 to $150 a month.He acknowledged that it was barely enough to live on. But he said he could make it work — even if he was now increasingly unsure when the date would come.“All I can do is hold on,” Mr. Meng said. “Keep holding on until I’ve reached the right age.”Mahjong in a Beijing park. The government has continued to raise pension payments for retirees.Thomas Peter/Reuters More