Beware middle-aged men waving feminist flags

On December 12, 2006, Ontario ended "mandatory retirement." As of that date, employers could no longer base termination decisions on an employee's age. Ontario was following the lead of Quebec and Manitoba, which stopped having a standard retirement age in the early 1980s.  Within a couple of years, mandatory retirement had effectively ended  right across the country. 

Fast forward to 2014. The first Ontario professors to elude retirement are now collecting their pensions. Yup, Canada Revenue Agency requires people to begin drawing their pensions at age 71, regardless of employment status.  The average salary of a full professor in Ontario is around $150,000 per year (see p. 7 here), and university pension plans are generally fairly generous. So a typical professor working full-time into his 70s will have a combined pension plus salary income of at least $200,000 a year, often more. No wonder professors 65 and older outnumber the under 35s (p. 21 here; 2010-11 data). Who would willingly give up a nice office, the freedoms of academia, and a quarter million dollars or so a year?

Now if the professors fighting to eliminate the standard retirement age had said, "we have a very pleasant lifestyle and we'd like to hang onto it, thank you very much," I could have respected their honesty, if nothing else. But instead, they draped themselves in the feminist flag. A standard retirement age of 65 was wrong because it hurt women.  Thomas Klassen and David Macgregor, writing in the CAUT (Canadian Association of University Teachers) Bulletin, challenged ageism in academy on the grounds that "Mandatory retirement at an arbitrary age is devastating for female faculty who often began their careers later than males and may have had interruptions to raise children." 

Gender-equity is also the basis of Lloyd Spurrell and Ahmed Hussein's arguments against what they call "Rule 65":

Because of their longer life expectancy, women must contribute significantly more to their pension plan by the time they are 65, if they are to be as financially secure as a man in the same situation. Women have to contribute enough for 20 years while men have to contribute enough for only 15 years. Why should women be discriminated against in this manner?

Yes, there are older female academics who will enjoy greater financial security as a result being able to work past 65. But let's think not about anecdotes - the stories of particular men and particular women. Overall, how many of the beneficiaries from the end of mandatory retirement are men, and how many are women? Who bears the costs of the transition?

Two thirds of university teachers between 65 and 69 are men (p. 22 here), as are three quarters of those over the age of 70. This is not simply a reflection of an academy that, 20 or 30 or 40 years ago, when these folks were hired, favoured men over women. Let's rewind five years, to when the people who are now 65 to 69 were 60 to 64. This is more or less the same group of people, just at two different points in time.

In 2005-6, just before the standard retirement age ended, 65 percent of academics aged 60 to 64 were male (p. 22 here).

In 2010-11, when that same cohort of people were 65-69, 68 percent of those working as university teachers were male. There is hardly any hiring of individuals into university teaching in that age group. The only plausible explanation of the three percentage point increase in the proportion of men in the academia is that the more women than men retired in that cohort.

What about all these women who started their academic careers late because they were looking after their children? Some of them are ending their academic careers early because they are looking after their grandchildren, or their parents, or their spouses.

For people in long-term relationships, retirement is a joint decision. US evidence finds that husbands and wives tend to retire at the same time. Female academics typically have partners who are either roughly the same age as them, or somewhat older. Some will choose to retire along with their spouse and travel the world. A certain percentage of male academics, however, find themselves at 65 with a much younger and very-much-in-the-labour-force spouse, or with a young and growing second family to support, or with children and step-children still in university, with tuition fees to be paid. It makes financial sense to keep working.

Finally, for traditional couples, a husband's retirement disrupts the established order of things. As one older woman I know used to say, "I married you for better or for worse, but not for lunch." That older colleague you wish would retire because he's such a pain to have around the department? Quite possibly his partner is hoping that he will continue working, for roughly the same reason.

Canadian experience to date shows that more men than women have taken advantage of the opportunity to continue working . Which shouldn't really be surprising, for, as the quotes above show, it was mostly men who were advocating for the change in the first place.

What about those who are hurt by the end of a standard retirement age? As Nick Rowe has argued, universities can't do much to change the revenues they get per student. They also can't do much to change the costs of employing a professor. Demographics and an already high participation rate means that there is no longer room to expand student numbers. Universities could make money by increasing class sizes and hiring fewer professors. But there is no room to expand professorial numbers (short of cutting salaries or, possibly, raising tuition fees).

If there are fewer professors leaving academia, there will be fewer new professors hired.

The PhD students in the pipeline are 47 percent female (p. 44), as are 46 percent of Canadian assistant professors (p. 28). Just 23 percent of full professors, however, are women. Replacing over 65 full professors with PhD students would result in a more gender-balanced academy.

I'm not trying to argue that we should reintroduce mandatory retirement in order to achieve greater gender balance. I am merely pointing out that who thought the end of mandatory retirement would disproportionately benefit women and promote gender equity were mistaken.

But what about the loss of human capital, the loss of knowledge, the loss of skill when tenured full professors are given the boot? My grandfather taught until he was around 80, as did my father. But both accepted a spot rate for their labour, that is, after retirement they worked as contract instructors. I have no objection to people working past 65; I do object to the amount of money some people are receiving for doing so.

If something can't go on forever, it won't. Universities can't afford to pay faculty members who are ineffectual teachers, desultory administrators, and unproductive researchers six figure salaries indefinitely. Spurrell and Hussein, in their article quoted above, make this prescient remark:

But performance and competence is not an age issue. One must be competent to perform one's duties regardless of one's age. If one is incompetent, he or she cannot expect to have that incompetence remain unchallenged merely because he or she is under 65.

If academics cannot be fired because they are old, they will have to be fired because they are incompetent. Thus the end of mandatory retirement will inevitably lead to the end of tenure as we know it (however see the comments on this post).

I would be prepared to argue that mandatory retirement should be abolished for everyone except university professors, because an indeterminate length employment contract is fundamentally incompatible with tenure. 

So I'm very wary whenever I encounter a middle-aged man waving a feminist flag.

Comments

[Bob Smith]

Great piece! The argument was so facially ridiculous in the first place, it could only have been made by a sociologist.

[Jim Sentance]

Just to be clear I have never waved that flag, or even thought of it that way to be honest.

I agree with you on your last point about mandatory retirement and tenure. Given the choice I'd keep tenure and accept mandatory retirement - though I should admit that I've managed to arrange my career so that I'll qualify for a full pension the day after I turn 65. Perhaps mandatory retirement but at a slightly higher age would be more acceptable.

Otherwise it seems clear that the job of implementing carrots and sticks to induce people to retire at a reasonable point still has a way to go.

[LInda Welling]

Do you have any data on the proportions of older female vs male faculty who are single and/or childless?

[Avon Barksdale]

Should not retirement decisions and policies be decided privately by professors and universities? It looks to me like the the problem is government monopoly. If, as you suggest, mandatory retirement improves the university, private arrangements would discovers this fact. If there is a price-quality trade-off with retirement policies, again, a private market would responded. What we are seeing here is an ocean of government money distorting everyone's choices - from the students decision to go to university in the first place (increasingly just signal buying), to the retirement decisions of faculty.

So, yes, in the rent seeking capture process, people make all kinds of self-serving BS arguments, and I mean BS in the technical, Harry Frankfurt, definition of the word. Professors invoking feminism as reason to end mandatory retirement is just that, BS. The people making the statement don't care to know or find out if it's actually true (which would then might require lying), it just sounds “equitable”. In that sense, these professors are not lying, they are just full of BS. But we should expect nothing less from rent seekers.

[Randy]

Incidentally, and mostly tangential to the post, I was midway through my PhD when the law came into effect (or the old law went out off effect, I guess). When I started my PhD, so many people told me that I was doing a PhD at a good time, because all the profs hired during the hiring boom of the 60s would be retiring and their positions would be opening up. The end of mandatory retirement didn't come as good news to me.

Of course, knowing more now about the job market for PhDs not in economics or engineering than I did when I started, there are many other reasons why the people who were telling me that it was a good time to do a PhD were wrong.

[Vladimir]

Some pension plans limit the entitlement to benefits if the beneficiary earns more from labour income than a set amount. In this example , say 150k is the max (labour income + pension)before pension benefits start to be reduced dollar for dollar. I'm not sure that the faculty associations would accept such a revision without an offset , say the increase in tenure track positions.

[whitfit]

For some faculty members over 65, they can keep "working" full time and still live a life of semi-retirement.

I don't blame those that do, the incentive is pretty clear. I know someone who is in that boat - tenured faculty position, still required to teach (the same courses that the materials have been developed for a long time), but the ability to not be productive in research and otherwise, and still take sabbaticals. Although this person is a good teacher, and in many ways an asset to some of his students, the workload hasn't prevented multiple long trips - so retirement isn't necessary to the seeing the world and indulging your hobbies part of the equation.

I would do the same thing in the same boat - get an extra 200-250k a year in salary and pension contributions and only work what is effectively part time - because the incentive is there.

But, I think academia is one of the few jobs where this can happen. In law, medicine, management and for other professions like teachers, there is no situation where you can semi retire and still get your full salary.

It is a weird part of the job market, and I think that younger academics are bearing the brunt of the fact that society is not happy to foot the bill for the cosy arrangement that many boomer academics got.

[Frances Woolley]

Linda: "Do you have any data on the proportions of older female vs male faculty who are single and/or childless?"

TAble 2.15 in the CAUT bulletin gives the % of male and female faculty who are childless. Slightly more women than men have no children in the home, but there's no age break down given. I hear you on the very serious struggles single women - especially female single parents - face in terms of saving for retirement. I've looked at the numbers.

Is there any way of promoting the well-being of these potentially vulnerable women - e.g. raising their salaries - that focuses the benefits of the policy a little more tightly on the group that's in need?

Vladimir: "some pension plans limit the entitlement to benefits". University pension plans were often negotiated by faculty members who were pretty good at working out how to structure pension plans. So, for example, in Carleton's plan, retirees have a choice of either a defined contribution plan or a defined benefit plan, and I don't think there are those tax-back rules. And I don't really see how one would put tax back rules on a defined contribution plan.

[Linda Welling]

@Frances: "Is there any way of promoting the well-being of these potentially vulnerable women - e.g. raising their salaries - that focuses the benefits of the policy a little more tightly on the group that's in need?" UVic has just adjusted women's salaries, as the result of a Gender Pay Equity report. UBC did the same; did Calgary as well? There is a question about how this will affect pensions - at the very least, if pensions are based on the past five years salaries, then retiring before the adjusted salary has been in affect for 5 years makes a difference.

[Dave]

"But let's think not about anecdotes - the stories of particular men and particular women."

And then later:

"As one older woman I know used to say, "I married you for better or for worse, but not for lunch." That older colleague you wish would retire because he's such a pain to have around the department? Quite possibly his partner is hoping that he will continue working, for roughly the same reason."

[Jacques René Giguère]

Whitfit: "there is no situation where you can semi retire and still get your full salary.". A doctor or a lawyer with no pension plan set aside his RRSP or TFSA. Then decide he want to work but not let his funds go to ingrate children. Draws down his kitty and vacation in Australia instead of Tampa, blowing his money on airfare.
As an aside: every Chamber of Commerce wails about the retirement crisis and the QC gov't has just retroactively began to cut pensions...supposedly because of "intergenerationnal equity." The solution is of course to keep older people working. But the austerians don't want any measure to grow the economy as to employ the surplus labor thus created (inter equity blabla don't want debt to finance stimulus Chamberof Sun newspaper blabla).

[whitfit]

Jacques Rene Giguere:

You are talking about them using their savings - I am talking about how some academics can get to a point where they can still draw their salary while working, ostensibly full time, but in reality at a pretty relaxed pace (usually at the top of their range).

The doctor or lawyer may have saved for their pension, and may be on easy street, but there is no law firm these days where a partner can work at a much reduced effort, and still draw big money. Doctors have to bill for services in order to earn money - there is no late career easy street where you can bill significant amounts while doing less work. I'm not arguing that academics are lazy or are overpaid, just that some of them can take advantage of a unique system where you can earn at the top of the pay scale while not being at the top of the productivity scale.

[Jacques René Giguère]

Whatever the law says, a pension is deferred (saved) compensation.
Any law partner can work a full time week, if there is work, and withdraw his savings, the way one withdraw his pension.
traveling to Australia and going to better hotels is a way of spending your extra money without spending extra time.

[Frances Woolley]

Dave: ""But let's think not about anecdotes - the stories of particular men and particular women.""

I've got numbers, dressed up with a few anecdotes.

The other side has anecdotes.

Strip away the anecdotes from both sides, and what's left?

I've got numbers. The other side has nothing.

[John Chant]

Bravo, Frances.

Absence of mandatory retirement might work in a system where employers have the ability and inclination to carry out tough personnel policies.

Ending mandatory retirement at universities just aggravates the consequences of their weak tenure, salary and dismissal decisions.

John Chant

[Nick Rowe]

The old system worked tolerably well for those who started in their late 20's, and stayed at the same job until 65. They were underpaid when young, and overpaid when old, but it all roughly balanced out. And they could always come back on contract past 65, by mutual agreement. It worked less well for those who wanted to leave earlier than 65 (they missed out on the good years), or who wanted to start later.

But yes, abolishing "mandatory" retirement, while leaving the rest of the old system intact, made it worse.

Eventually the system will change more fully, probably quite soon, because a number of universities (I forget which) have serious accumulated deficits (especially unfunded pension liabilities). (I expect you could argue it's already changing, with more contract instructors?) But it's going to be quite messy, with a lot of conflict.

But when you have a flag, and create a hegemonic discourse (did I use that buzzword right?), everything else tends to get wrapped in that same flag, whether it's related or not. "Free trade/HST creates jobs!".

[Frances Woolley]

John - thank you - as you are one of my all-time fav former profs, and also someone who has experienced mandatory retirement, your words mean a lot to me.

Nick - yes, I agree, it is already changing. I think one reason the tenure/gender discussion has got people so riled up is that there has been a serious ramp up in tenure standards. I know of far more people (of both genders) who have been denied tenure in the past 5 years than I ever did before. Now that's partly because there was no hiring for so long, but I still think there's something to it.

[Haynes Goddard]

Nick Rowe makes an important point. I started my career relatively late for economists, at age 29, and we did not start our family for three more years. So not having to retire at 65 was a great help because we were paying college tuition until my age 58, had put off important house repairs, and had not been been able to do much saving outside of the university plan. Working to age 70 has been important. And my observation is that few work beyond age 70. If that is correct, it is a one time adjustment in the system.

But it is worse for the sciences -- my son finished his post-docs at age 38, so his time for saving for retirement is reduced. Retirement at 65 would create hardships.

Efficiency - equity trade-offs. No clear solution.

[Frances Woolley]

Hayes -

sorry, where is the efficiency-equity trade-off here?

It does seem to be true that few work beyond 70, but the sting is in the tail of the distribution. Even in the days when there was a standard retirement age, there was one emeritus colleague who insisted upon coming into work every day even though he had Alzheimers. It was tricky because his wife clearly wasn't able to cope, so the department did what it could to help her out for a while. For the protection of students, and the integrity of the university, there has to be a way of getting people out of the system. And whatever change comes down in the end, current job protections will be eroded.

" And my observation is that few work beyond age 70. If that is correct, it is a one time adjustment in the system"

And what does that one-time adjustment look like? People starting careers later and ending them later? Given that productivity tends to decline with age, on average, this hardly seems to be an improvement. Or fewer people having academic careers, but the lucky few who get a foot in the door hanging on for longer? Again, hardly seems an improvement. Or does the one-time adjustment involve changes to termination processes and procedures?

[Neil]

Whitfit: The doctor or lawyer may have saved for their pension, and may be on easy street, but there is no law firm these days where a partner can work at a much reduced effort, and still draw big money.

Actually, professions where becoming a partner is part of the normal career progression can usually pull this off. It depends on the firm (equitable partnerships are going to be pushier for all partners to pull their weight), but at least in law, most firms use an "eat what you kill" model of profit sharing, where you get paid based on the work that you bring in. A partner can still bring in big bucks from their established client relationships, while pushing the actual work on to associates and paralegals.

[Frances Woolley]

Neil - interestingly enough, the Supreme Court of Canada has upheld mandatory retirement for law and other partnerships: http://business.financialpost.com/2014/05/22/supreme-court-of-canada-upholds-mandatory-retirement-clause-in-law-firm-partnership-agreement/. Parallels to unis?

[Bob Smith]

"A partner can still bring in big bucks from their established client relationships, while pushing the actual work on to associates and paralegals."

Sure, but they gotta work. They may be making big bucks based on the work done by their associates or paralegals, but they're still billing 1500 hours a year and docketing another 800 in non-billable time (some of which - but by no means most - might consist of boozy dinners). Let's face it, if the clients come to them, they want to know that they're working on the file. That's veerrrryyyy different from teaching a couple of hours a week and having your TAs do all the work. The only place where you might be able to pull that off is where you're the only owner of the firm or the founder or something like that.

Some firms may be willing to work out alternative arrangements whereby a senior partner takes on a more limited role (often as "counsel" rather than "partner", though they often keep their former title for external purposes) at a reduced workload (and compensation) while he or she transition their files to their juniors (and I've seen happen a fair bit recently), but that really depends on the individual lawyer and firm. It's by no means universal.

[Ingrid Bryan]

Great post, Frances. I have been retired for 8 years - some of my former colleagues who are well beyond the traditional retirement are still working. My main concern has always been that they block positions for young people.

[Jacques René Giguère]

Wouldn't be a problem if macro policies were expansionnist enough to accomodate larger labor force.

[Frances Woolley]

Ingrid - thanks so much for the thumbs up - as one of the women in that cohort, your voice matters.

Jacques Rene - yes and no - even with a larger labor force, there might still be a need for adjustment, to move people around in the labour market to where their skills might be best utilized. Old people, for example, have a comparative advantage in working on asbestos removal, and with hazardous waste, as they're reasonably likely to die before succumbing to an asbestos- or other related cancer (FW channelling her inner Larry Summers...)

[Jacques René Giguère]

Adjustments? Of course. But they are easier at full employment.
The irony is that a lot of people bemoaning the generationnal imbalance and offering late-taking of pension as remedy are also austerians. They are against full employment. Some are bright enough to understand the value of a zero shadow price (or as marxist call it the reserve army of the unemployed). Most are plain dumb and clueless.
I realize now that my wish to become a fighter pilot in the RCN (it had an aircraft carrier at the time, showing the source of my age-induced wisdom), denied by my better was only a sign that I shoud wait till I am expendable. Where is my carrier?

[Jack PQ]

Isn't an important part of the problem the professor's salary schedule? Why should professors earn little when they start and much more later on? The US approach, although it has problems of its own, allows for a higher assistant professor salary, but raises are lower and far from automatic. An unproductive (actual or perceived) faculty member can stay at the same salary level his or her entire life. In my short time teaching in the US, I saw several instances of assistant professors earning more than some full professors did. It is no silver bullet, but surely it should be part of the conversation.