Personality and Employment Transitions at Older Ages
Direct and Indirect Effects Through Non-Monetary Job Characteristics
Published in: Labour, Volume 31, Issue 2 (June 2017), Pages 127-152. doi: 10.1111/labr.12090
Posted on RAND.org on August 18, 2017
We study whether individuals with different personality traits systematically exhibit different retirement trajectories. We find weak direct associations between personality and employment transitions. On the other hand, personality does contribute indirectly to these transitions by moderating the effects of non-monetary job characteristics. Specifically, workers with different traits are observed to follow different retirement paths when faced with similar physical demands, computer skills requirements, job flexibility, and age discrimination in the workplace. Contrary with other economic domains, conscientiousness does not have the strongest association with retirement; the other components of the Big Five personality traits show more salient patterns.
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