Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32 Page 33 Page 34 Page 35 Page 36 Page 37 Page 38 Page 39 Page 40 Page 41 Page 42 Page 43 Page 44 Page 45 Page 46 Page 47 Page 48 Page 49 Page 50 Page 51 Page 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 76 Page 77 Page 78 Page 79 Page 80 Page 81 Page 82 Page 83 Page 84 Page 85 Page 86 Page 87 Page 88 Page 89 Page 90 Page 91 Page 92 Page 93 Page 94 Page 95 Page 96 Page 97 Page 98 Page 99 Page 100 Page 101 Page 102 Page 103 Page 104 Page 105 Page 106 Page 107 Page 108AGING IN THE 21S T CENTURY 34 because they vary across countries and cause people to retire early in some countries and late in others. Their study uses HRS data along with data from HRS sister studies in England and 11 other European countries. Information on a word recall task is used to indicate cognitive ability. Countries with earlier retirement ages have much lower cognitive scores than those with workers who stay in the labor force longer. Another study uses early retirement offers to estimate the effect of retirement on cognitive functioning (Coe et al. 2011). Early retirement windows are defined in HRS as a financial in- centive offered at a particular time to encourage workers to leave a firm. Such offers should be independent of an individual’s health status since in general they are only offered to broad groups of workers, not to individuals. Overall, there is no relationship between the length of retirement and cognitive functioning given the condition of early retirement windows. In fact, there appears to be some benefit of retirement to the cognitive functioning of blue collar workers. Possibly the options for intellectual stimulation are more lim- ited on blue collar jobs, and retirement may offer more opportunities in this regard. Another study took a novel approach to sorting out cause and effect between retirement and health by using individuals’ retirement expectations to isolate the effect of retirement on a health index that includes both objective and subjective measures of health status (Insler 2014). Using HRS data from 1992 through 2010, this study finds a beneficial effect of retirement on health status, especially for those who quit smoking. Similarly, Fonseca et al. (2014) use cross-national variation in pensions to study the effects of retirement on subjective well-being and find that, across several countries, retirement leads to increased life satisfaction overall. Working longer may be associated with longer lives. Wu et al. (2016) follow the original HRS cohort from 1992 until their retirement or death over the next 18 years. In the group who say that health was not an important reason for their retirement, working an extra year is associated with an 11% lower risk of death. Even those who say poor health affected their decision to retire, working longer is associated with slightly greater longevity. Retirement Satisfaction HRS can also be used to track trends in retire- ment satisfaction and to follow individuals to see how retirement satisfaction might change as we age. An Employee Benefits Research Institute (EBRI) report shows that in 1998, 60.5% of HRS retirees reported feeling very satisfied with retirement (EBRI 2016a). By 2012, this percent- age decreased to 48.6% (Figure 1-7). On the other hand, those reporting being moderately satisfied increased. The share that report being not at all satisfied remains relatively steady over this period at about 10%. Following the same indi- viduals as they age, retirement satisfaction tends to decrease with age. Not surprisingly, those with higher net worth report higher retirement satisfaction than those with lower net worth. Likewise, those in worse health report lower retirement satisfaction, which may help explain the aging effect. Retirement leads to increased life satisfaction overall. Figure 1-7  Trends in percent “very satisfied” with retirement by age: 1998-2014 Source: EBRI (2016a). 35% 40% 45% 50% 55% 60% 65% 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 55-64 People aged: 65-74 75-84 85+