Casualties of a labor contraction

By Robert Rogers

When Samuel Gomez retired from his job in public works for the city of Pomona in 1999, he was ready for a long, smooth ride into the retirement sunset.

55-years-old at the time, Gomez figured some savings, maybe part-time work, and a $600 per month pension would keep him afloat until Social Security.

But today, at 63, the Fontana resident finds himself part of a growing group: Senior citizens and retirees reliant on insufficient fixed incomes and confronted by a tight labor market.

“I look at the classifieds, talk to friends and even go to the unemployment office sometimes,” Gomez said. “It worked before, but now it’s slow everywhere, nobody’s hiring.”

The spread of seniors and retirees into the work force is a growing phenomenon, which partly explains the dearth of open positions, say economists and senior group advocates.

Today’s seniors are impacted by dueling trends: An unprecedented level of health and vitality into their golden years and an economy torn by tepid growth and building inflation, particularly in energy and health care for those not yet 65, that has swamped their fixed incomes.

The result is that stories like Gomez’ have become more common, as older workers wade into a labor pool now so competitive that even the most rudimentary and low-paying jobs can seem beyond their reach.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports, more than 15 percent of American workers are over 55, up from 13 percent in 2000. By 2015, an estimated one in five workers will be over 55.

Although unemployment rates for seniors and retirees are hard to track since they often don’t file for unemployment assistance, it is clear that an economy trending downward can hit senior citizen-employees - who often take small, part-time jobs for social and monetary benefits - particularly hard, said Eric Nilsson, a Cal State San Bernardino labor economist.

“There are a slew of inderict mechanisms pushing elderly people into the labor force,” Nilsson said. “But at the same time, there are forces working against them in their searches for employment.”

While rising prices have strained fixed incomes to the break point, it’s often something else tugging retirees back into the job hunt.

“When you’ve been working your whole life and then you stop, it’s easy to get sedentary, start gaining weight, and it’s downhill fast from there,” said Judy Pick, a 65-year-old retired Los Angeles County social worker who works as an unpaid volunteer excercise instructor at the Knopf Senior Center in Fontana. “The problem right now is that getting those small jobs, that work for extra money and that keeps people mentally and physically active, are just harder to get.”

Studies have long indicated that leading an active life into your retirement years helps people live longer and healthier. Low-stress work can be part of that regimen. According to a 2002 national AARP survey of employed workers aged 45 to 74, more than two-thirds said they planned to work or were working beyond the traditional retirement age of 65.

Perhaps more tellingly, 34 percent said they would work part-time for interest or enjoyment, not financial gain.

Personal enrichment and widening her social circle is the key reason one 67-year-old Yucaipa woman is seeking work, so far unsuccessfully at a handful of small retail businesses.

The woman, a college-educated former social worker, declined to give her name because she fears divulging her age and struggles may hinder her prospects of being hired in a county government job for which she’s applied.

“I feel like 67 is the new 57, but the outside world sees us like a second or third option in the job market.” she said. “I just want to contribute, to be part of something.”

Like most people in today’s economy, seniors often find it impossible to live solely on fixed-income provided by pension, Social Security and savings, or sometimes combinations of all three.

Pick said chatter around lunch time and in classes at the Knopf Center has increasingly turned to grumbles about high prices and scant work opportunities. Pick herself is just a bit better off, making due on about $500 monthly in Social Security and a county government pension. She volunteers at the Knopf Center to keep her classes free to other cash-strapped seniors, she said.

“You hear a lot about people trying to get work, just little jobs, and getting turned down, and they can’t believe it,” Pick said. “I don’t understand it. These people are assets, the wisdom and the work ethic is there.”

But the jobs, at least stable ones, may not be.

In San Bernardino County, the unemployment rate stands at about 6.4 percent, according to the state’s Unemployment Development Department, up from just 5 percent in March 2007. Over that period, nearly 13,000 jobs have been lost, while the labor force has remained steady.

The trend of leaner, more cost-conscious employers may be hitting senior members of the workforce particularly hard, Nilsson said.

“In this kind of uncertain economic environment, the jobs cut first are the non-critical jobs,” Nilsson said. “And those tend to be the jobs the elderly are looking for. You can do without the person who hands out the cart or greets the customers, but you can’t do without some other aspects of a business.”

Commerce Department statistics released last month showed core inflation in the fourth quarter of 2007 revving up to 2.5 percent. Core inflation excludes food and energy prices, which have spiked much more violently.

With pensions in decline for decades and the already small Social Security checks squeezed by rising prices, all indications are that the aged more often don’t have the luxury of taking to their rocking chairs en masse.

Ultimately, the graying of America’s most heralded generation is, economically, a mixed bag.

“Seniors can bring a lot to the table,” Nilsson said. “They often are on average more skilled, mature and reliable. But the downside, from an employers perspective, is that they may not really need the job. In this economic environment, a less skilled and mature 20-year-old may be the more desirable option because he expects less in terms treatment, workload, etc.”

According to the National Governors Association, a Washington D.C.-based public policy organization, the number of workers aged 55 or older will increase by 49 percent from 2002 to 2012.

Meanwhile, the first of 77 million baby boomers began turning 60 in 2006.

The number of Americans over 55 will grow to 108 million in 2030, an unprecedented swelling of that demographic, and nearly double the 60 million in the country today.

Advocates and experts say subsidized employment, job training, job placement and other community-based programs are key to easing tens of millions of aging baby boomers into golden years employment.

Experience Corps, a program supported by Civic Ventures, has more than 2,000 people over 55 in 19 U.S. cities working as tutors and mentors for young students. The program is at work no further south than Oakland and San Francisco.

The San Francisco-based Civic Ventures think tank pointed to California and Arizona, among five states nationally, that are working toward better-using older workers in its economy.

But the high ranking may have less to do with San Bernardino County than other parts of the state.

Experience Corps has programs in Oakland and San Francisco, but none in the state’s southern region.
Another program, Experience Works, is a national employment program targeted for low-income older citizens launched during Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society Program.

It too, has offices in the northern part of the state, but not the southern.

San Bernardino County’s Department of Aging and Adult Services runs a Senior Training and Employment Program (STEP) and dozens of county senior centers, including the Knopf Center.

But in tough economic times, seniors who want or need to work often are faced with limited opportunities, at least until the economic downturn reverses.

“Older Americans are now finding that their financial health is much less secure than it was for past generations’,” Nilsson said. “The nest eggs, the pensions, the Social Security, it’s all much more likely to fall short.”

For now, at least Gomez faces an economy bleak for would-be workers like him in the company of others sharing his plight. He lunches every day at the Knopf Center.

“I have friends here,” he said, “who know exactly what this is like.”

robert.rogers@sbsun.com (909) 386-3855