Employment of elderly people in Hong Kong

vocation of of succession(p) mint in Hong KongIn the other(prenominal) decades, the discussion of work and senescence has aroused round-eyedly public and headmaster thinking. In this paper, I would begin with the analysis of the current Hong Kong situations and char traveleristics of iodinetime(a)er workers, among which I pay well-nigh of assistance to the low participation rate of hoary workers and try to demonstrate the reason accounting for that. The second part green goddess be seen as a brief summary of the productiveness and limitations of gray-haired workers in Hong Kong today. Finally, I would come up with several suggestions on how to gain repel crusade participation.Keywords use of goods and services of of age(p), productivity, functional limitation, over-the-hill workerEmployment of cured peopleSituations of the practice of senior(a) in Hong KongWith the baby boomer generations entering into their centenarian years, the employment of older people has brought ab aside wide public concern. According to the sources from Census and Statistics Department, at the middle of 2010, there ar more than 1.78 million Hong Kong people everywhere the age of 55, 51.46 percent of whom ar age 65 and above, and 25.76 percent of whom be age 75 and above. legion(predicate) of these people are working or puzzle had work regard and, many of retired persons work at least part time subsequently they leave their permanent job.Among all the features of older workers in Hong Kong today, we would focus on several main characteristics to help us beneathstand the situation.Labor force participation ratesIn Hong Kong 2009, the drudge force participation rates, which arouse to the proportion of economically alert universe (that is the dig force) in the union population aged 15 and above was 26.5 percent for the age 55 and above. Among that, we can learn that the labor force participation rate for this age group was apparently higher for ma les (37.6 percent) than for females (15.9 percent). Neverthe slight, nearly ten years ago, the labor force participation rates of the age 55 or over was 56 percent, which is al more or less twice the number of today.The employed and unemployed populationThe unemployment rate of older worker is relatively lower than that of teen workers. In 2009, the unemployment rate for age group of 60 or above was 3.1 percent, which intimately lower than its counterpart aged 20-29 group of 7.3 percent. There are a few reasons accounting for that, but the most heavy one would be that older people can retire as an utility(a) choice.On the other batch, people over the age of 50 are put a modality employed for a number of reasons. Thomas Leavitt once mentions that, the majority of people at ages 50-62 would still choose to work mostly because they enjoy the bliss and efficacious feeling brought by working, which followed by the destiny to make money. However, at the age of 62 or over, the req uirement for money becomes their major concern. low-spirited labor force participation rate among older personsThe downward way in labor force participation rates among elder is considered by many people. First of all, many would agree that the current accessible certification policy carried turn up by the government is encour maturement the increased employment rate for young people by removing the old workers in the labor force. Turner inevitably that for any presumptuousness employee at any given time, the alternative of retiring on a pension is more attr officious than to nutriment working for a salary. (Turner, 1993) The social security and medical care of old people do protect them from low income, but is also reduces the employment rate.The productivity and functional limitations of older workersMost of us would agree that fatty activity plays a significant role in successful agedness and higher self- connect happiness. Older people who remain high train of produc tivity accomplish better physical functioning and are less plausibly to die six years after self-report. Therefore, we would like to ask how elderly Hong Kong people will take part in economic and social activities?The assumption that age and job performance are closely related has been confirmed by a variety of maturement researches (McEvoy and Cascio, 1989). On one hand, many reported that older workers are more productive than younger workers for that they tend to be more dependable, careful and responsible. Certainly, no evidence shows that instruction capacities will significantly fall with the aging process. Therefore, it is important to find out aged related decline causes so that we can extend work-life for elderly by providing protections, services and benefits.On investigating the effects of the potential of aging grow on the productivity of older worker, I pay attention to the following factorsAge-related physical changes and limitationsThere are many indications imp ly that the skill of people declines with the aging process. Many people at age of 60 report that physically demanding job is hard and strenuous for them to carry on, so they tend to leave the work that is highly physical in nature. isolated from changes in strength, old people also experience the physical divergence of endurance and balance and, an increase of reaction time as a result of peripheral nervous system gradually slows down.With regard to intumesceness and rehabilitation, it is easy-accepted that the measures of functional capacity can reflect the extent to which elderly are able to work. However, the functional capacity does not merely mean an absence of disease. There are conditions which are directly related to aging, such as heart disease, cancer and stroke. While for those conditions such as comprehend and opthalmic impairment, they are not necessarily the functional limitations preventing people from work.Annis and colleagues (Annis et al. 1991) also cogit ate that weight gains are regarded as the fifth decade of life, followed by declines. They mentions in their research on anthropometric changes with age the individuals body dimensions change also, characterized by increases in the size of the stomach and hips. Moreover, some old workers admit that they have difficulties to perform tasks involving highly repetitive manual actions, the use of small hand tools or using force (Tayyari Sohrabi, 1990).Age-related cognitive changes and limitationsThe traditional discussion intimately changes in cognitive office of old people focuses on intelligence, memory, and information and so on. According to medical findings, brain loses weight as a result of shrinking neuron size in cerebral pallium and some psychogenic problems such as depression and dementia stuff and nonsenseize with aging. Yet in magnitude to perceive the complicated race mingled with cognitive change and working ability, I refer to some mental models of cognitive scie nces to help us understand the situation in which old people gain knowledge, skills and experience through aging while spill perceptual capacity and motor speed.When assessing the changes in intelligence, major longitudinal studies (Schaie, 1985) claim that most individuals can maintain the stable intellectual level well into their seventies and over and that modifiability in brain function continue well into late adulthood. But findings also suggest that people tend to less efficiently process complex information with increase of age. Overall, there is no obvious evidence show that old peoples performance is unsatisfactory under the daily and ordinary job situations. Even if there are changes in problem-solving ability of older people, they can use job experience and all-embracing skills to compensate age-related slowing performance. Older adults deliver a decline performance on lab-related cognitive task but demonstrate good level performance in real-world job, and there appears to be no significant relationship between age and job capacities.Warren Buffett, born in 1930 and ranked as the worlds second wealthiest person in 2009, is one of the most successful, active and smart investors in the stock and capital market of the world today. He is often called the legendary investor Warren Buffett for his precisely judgment of the market and honor invest philosophy. But he is not a special fount in the expertise, problem solving and decision making condition of old people. Actually, everyday plenty of old adults are making the most important and complicated decisions in the world as executives, politicians, and world leaders. Researches find that cognitive processes appear to be more important in the differentiating the old and young managers. Expertise in a certain field can act as an improvement to cognitive aging. In a research conducted to check up on the relationship between cognitive aging and experience, sociologists find that among experienced player s, those who are skilled in bidding strategies could ameliorate the negative influence of cognitive aging until nearly the age of 60.The highest level of a job comment would be the creative thinking. The researches focus on creativity and idea productivity state that originality declines gradually from younger worker to older workers.Age-related sensorial and perceptual changes and limitationsWhen concern about old peoples visual changes, Fozard (1990) presents four main sensory and perceptual capacities we need to focus most. Firstly, he concludes that excessive extent of elucidation can cause elderly workers adversely reactions. For example, older workers have shown to be more adversely affected by glare from lights in workplace. Secondly, he also mentions the disability of older adults to detect different visual stimuli, which he calls poor contrast. Old workers require more contrast between the stimuli originally distinguishing them. Furthermore, a third age-related change i n visual ability is the useful field of view, in which older workers gain messages from environment. Finally, he also points out that the decrease level of visual activity of older adult take on about the fact that they are not favorable to read printed material (Fozard, 1990).It is well recognized that many older people experience hearing changes such as difficulties to hear sounds at high frequencies. Some measure we find older people would speak louder because they cannot hear themselves. What is more, many manifest swage to understand what they have clearly heard at a given loudness. Suggestion about this can include reduce distracting noise in working place for old people.When we talk about older people, the most common stereotype of them would be slow to perceive things as an aging deficit. Scientific research findings indicate that it will take nearly 1.2 times longer for older people to finish cognitive process than their counterpart.In a conclusion, job performance is clo sely related to functional ability but deficits with aging can not necessarily prevent most of older workers from being still effective and qualified employees. Older workers have positive effects on labor force productivity and economic growthEncourage the labor force participation rate of elderlyAfter talking about all the strength and deficits of older work, I would like to focus on the dealings with means of expanding the opportunities for them to regain active participants in the labor market.In the first place, empirical evidence that elderly have difficulty integrating information from multiple sources gives us a clue to develop communication and information-handling systems for older workers in workplace. For this reason, the priority for aim the system is to be acceptable by majority of users.What is more, in order to integrate into the labor force, older worker are longing for gentility of the new technology or skills in an easy to comprehensive way when they face up the difficulties with computerized work situations. Training and educational programs would be rightfully helpful if we handle them on the right direction. That means we understand that elderly employees have alternative requirements for different position.Finally, if the government could apply more practicable social policy and promote the social perspectives of the whole community, the low labor force participation rate may grow to meet the need of older people in Hong Kong. Even though we understand unemployment, no matter for young or old, is a problem brought about by economic recession, policy can still try to help aging who really need assistance in meeting their daily needs and can live peacefully.