You read a lot these days about the so-called Great Resignation, as companies grapple with employees leaving their jobs at abnormally high rates, mainly those in their prime working years.
This trend, however, does not necessarily apply to older employees, according to a survey released Monday by the Nationwide Retirement Institute.
The survey found that a quarter of employer-sponsored retirement plan participants 45 and older report that they have pushed back their retirement, or resigned themselves to not retiring at all, because of the pandemic. Worse, 30% of participants 65 and older say the same thing.
The NRI survey found that plan participants looking to delay retirement expect to work for at least three years later, on average, than they had had thought they would before the pandemic.
As a result, 48% of these employees report feeling frustrated, 42% worried, 38% sad and 17% hopeless.
Not surprisingly, these emotions have consequences for their work lives. Forty-eight percent say delayed retirement has negatively affected their mental health.
Thirty-nine percent indicated that it has damaged their morale at work, and 23% reported that they are less productive.
