However, a large-scale, longitudinal perspective on how organizations have reacted to demographic challenges is missing in the literature. In this study we fill this gap and ask how organizations approach older workers, how these approaches change over time, and in which sectors of the economy and in what types of organizations the changes were most profound. Data come from two large-scale employer surveys: 2009 (n=1,077) and 2017 (n=1,358) representative for the Netherlands. We use a three-step group-comparison latent class analysis (LCA) combined with multinomial logistic model.
We distinguish four clusters of organizations based on their practices regarding older workers—those trying to activate and develop their employees (active), focusing on exit measures (exit), implementing all age management practices (all), and practicing no age management (none). We demonstrate a major shift in employers’ approaches to aging workforces between 2009 and 2017, with strong decreases in those that offered no age management (47% to 30%) and those focusing on exit measures (21% to 6%), and an increase in active organizations (19% to 52%).