More older women have jobs than ever before, meaning they now outstrip working men of a corresponding age, according to official figures in the UK.

Men aged 50 and over suffered badly in the previous two recessions, in the early 1980s and early 1990s. Many older workers in manufacturing industries were forced into early retirement or moved onto incapacity benefit.

Employment rates for older men have recovered since the early 1990s but they have been overtaken in the job market by women as the sexes approach the ages at which they become eligible for state pensions, currently 60 for women and 65 for men.

The employment rate for men in the five years before the male state pension age is 58.4 per cent compared with 63.9 per cent for women aged 55 to 60. The employment rate beyond pension age is also slightly higher for women at 12.3 per cent compared with 10.7 per cent for men, according to ONS.

Age discrimination laws introduced two years ago should make it harder for employers to single out middle-aged men for redundancy, because they are more highly paid and closer to retiring, than others.

Pressure on companies to fund pensions also means employers will no longer be able to use pension arrangements to cushion the impact of early retirement. New rules introduced today will also make it more difficult to access incapacity benefits

According to ONS the overall male employment rate has fallen from more than 90 per cent in the early 1970s to about 79 per cent. In spite of this long-term decline, male unemployment has risen by only 2.9 percentage points while economic inactivity among males has increased by 11.3 per cent.

“The older workers who lost their jobs had more difficulty finding new work and many ended up, more or less permanently, on invalidity benefits and were therefore likely not to be recorded as unemployed,” said ONS.

The female employment rate over the same period has risen from less than 60 per cent in the 1970s to slightly more than 70 per cent. The gap as a result has narrowed from 35.7 percentage points to 8.4 percentage points. Women, however, are more likely to work part time than men.

The average retirement age for men has risen to 64.6, the highest level since 1984 and to 61.9 years for women, says Taen (The Age and Employment Network). The government intends to increase the state pension age to 65 for women between 2010 and 2020.

Chris Ball, Taen's chief executive, said: “Particularly interesting is that only a third of women working over the age of 50 are now actually retiring before they reach their current state pension age of 60 and that in the five years leading up to their state pension ages, more women are working than men.

“The fact that the average actual retirement age of women has risen to 61.9 years, is indicative of both the ‘pensions disadvantage' that women of that generation face – both in regard to state and occupational pensions – and also of a genuine desire amongst many of them to go on working.”

The increase in the ages at which both men and women aged above 50 were withdrawing from the labour force showed the trend towards earlier retirement has been reversed.

英國官方數據顯示，英國在職老年女性比以往任何時候都多，在相應年齡段超過了在職男性。

在上世紀80年代初和90年代初的兩次衰退中，年滿50歲的男性遭受了沉重沖擊。制造業中的許多老年雇員被迫提前退休或申請喪失工作能力福利(Incapacity Benefit)。

自上世紀90年代初以來，老年男性的就業率開始回升，但在接近符合領取政府養老金的年齡——目前是女性60歲，男性65歲——時，就業市場中的女性多于男性。

英國國家統計局(ONS)的數據顯示，60至65歲男性的就業率是58.4%，而55至60歲的女性為63.9%。超過退休年齡的女性的就業率為12.3%，也略高于男性的10.7%。

兩年前生效的禁止年齡歧視法應使得雇主更加難以辭退中年雇員。中年雇員比其他員工待遇更高，也更接近退休年齡。

公司支付養老金的壓力也意味著，雇主再也不能利用養老金安排來緩解雇員提前退休的影響。昨日開始實施的新法律也將使人們更難以獲得喪失工作能力福利。

英國國家統計局稱，英國男性的整體就業率已從上世紀70年代初的逾90%降至約79%。盡管長期就業率下降，但男性失業率僅上升了2.9個百分點，而男性中無經濟活動(economic inactivity)的比例上升了11.3%。

英國國家統計局表示：“失業的老年雇員更難以找到新工作，許多人最終——差不多是永久性地——只得領取喪失工作能力福利，因此可能不會登記為失業。”

同期，女性就業率從上世紀70年代的不到60%上升至稍高于70%，與男性的就業率之差從35.7個百分點縮小至8.4個百分點。但女性比男性更有可能從事兼職工作。

英國年齡與就業網絡(Taen)表示，英國男性的平均退休年齡已上升至64.6歲——為1984年以來的最高水平，而女性的平均退休年齡為61.9歲。英國政府打算在2010年至2020年間將女性的法定退休年齡提高至65歲。

Taen首席執行官克里斯•鮑爾(Chris Ball)稱：“特別有意思的是，50歲以上的就業女性中，目前僅有三分之一確實會在年滿60歲的法定退休年齡之前退休。在到達法定退休年齡之前的5年，就業女性比男性更多。”

“女性平均實際退休年齡上升至61.9歲的事實，既說明了那一代女性‘在養老金方面的劣勢地位'——包括國家和職業養老金，也說明有許多女性真心希望繼續工作。”

50歲以上者——不論男女——離開勞動力市場年齡的上升，表明提前退休的趨勢已發生逆轉