Ed Chandler, 73, worked most of his life in a West Virginia factory. It didn't take long for him to get bored when he retired. “You can only cut so much grass and piddle around in the garden so much,” he said. So he did what a growing number of older Americans are doing. He un-retired.
Rural states like West Virginia need workers. They have thousands of jobs they can't fill. Yet they've often overlooked one resource they tend to have in abundance. With the right opportunities and working conditions, older people like Chandler could fill a lot of those jobs—and provide a much-needed boost to rural economies.
“People in my age bracket still have contributions to make,” Chandler said. “They might not be in the strenuous occupations we had prior, but they're still positive contributions we can make to the world in which we live.” A former pipefitter, he now delivers flowers in his hometown of Charleston, W.Va. Younger workers, he added, “can learn a lot from the work ethic of the older generation.”
The story is the same from North Dakota to Oklahoma to Vermont. “We can't find help anywhere,” one rural employer said in a recent news story. “We have so many vacancies,” said another. Getting more people into the workforce has become “the challenge of our time,” West Virginia Governor Patrick Morrisey declared earlier this year. At last count, his state had around 3,000 more unfilled jobs than it had people looking for work.
Morrisey and other leaders are working against time. Nearly 20 percent of rural Americans are old enough to retire. And when they do, there's often nobody coming in to fill their place. The civilian labor force has been growing for years in cities and suburbs. It's been falling in rural areas.
Nearly 20 percent of rural Americans are old enough to retire. And when they do, there's often nobody coming in to fill their place.
But just because someone is retirement age doesn't mean they're retirement-bound. Rural leaders and business groups often describe the aging of their populations as an unmovable force working against them. It only takes a small change of perspective to see the opportunities here.
A few years ago, RAND, the research organization where I work, carried out one of the most in-depth surveys of American workers ever. What we found was striking. Nearly 40 percent of workers 65 and older had tried retirement at some point and, like Ed Chandler, decided it wasn't for them. And more than half of the older Americans who were retired said they would consider coming back for the right opportunity.
Those older workers, like all workers, want to be able to provide for themselves and their families. But they also want meaningful jobs that value their experience. They want comfortable working conditions, less physical labor, and flexible hours. In fact, another RAND study found that a flexible schedule did more to keep older people in the workforce than a 20 percent pay raise.
Older workers are not going to shore up the construction industry. You wouldn't want to see them flagging traffic or putting in long hours at a factory. But there are plenty of other growth industries that could be a fit. West Virginia, for example, anticipates several thousand job openings in education, healthcare, and professional services. It can't realize its full economic potential without filling them.
States like West Virginia should be doing everything they can to encourage older workers to fill those jobs. Training programs could help workers update their skills. Caregiving services would free up time for those juggling family commitments. States could also offer tax breaks to older workers who rejoin the workforce—and to the employers who hire them. Those employers could help by providing older employees with more control over their schedules, including opportunities to work part-time.
The idea isn't to force older people back into the workforce, but rather to recognize that not everyone wants to retire in their mid-60s. Making it easier for them to keep working, or to rejoin the workforce, benefits everyone. Rural places need workers, and there are plenty of people like Chandler who are eager for the opportunity.
“Working a couple, three days a week puts a few bucks in your pocket,” he said. “But it also gets you that social interaction, which, to me, is just vitally important. It keeps your mind sharp. Keeps your heart in tune.”
