The Center for Retirement Research at Boston College has published a new brief tracking changes in older adults’ labor force participation in the context of COVID-19. The authors report that the pandemic triggered labor force exits among older workers, with 15 percent of the pre-pandemic group exiting the workforce by the one-year mark. However, the brief also shows that there has been no increase in people specifically reporting being “retired” nor in Social Security benefit applications, suggesting that at least some of these workers may be planning an eventual workforce return.
