1
Early retirement and post-retirement health
a
by
Daniel Hallberg
b
, Per Johansson
c
and Malin Josephson
d
May 19, 2014
Abstract
This paper studies empirically the consequences of retirement on health. We make use
of a targeted retirement offer to army employees 55 years of age or older. Before the
offer was implemented in the Swedish defense, the normal retirement age was 60 years
of age. Estimating the effect of the offer on individuals‟ health within the age range 56-
70, we find support for a reduction in both mortality and in inpatient care as a
consequence of the early retirement offer. Increasing the mandatory retirement age may
thus not only have positive government income effects but also negative effects on
increasing government health care expenditures.
Keywords: Health, Mortality, Inpatient care, Retirement, Health care, Pensions,
Occupational pensions
JEL-codes: J22, J26, I18
a
We are grateful to Marcus Eliasson, Peter Nilsson and Helena Holmlund for their very useful comments on an
earlier version of the paper. Comments from seminar participants at Uppsala Center for Labor Studies (UCLS),
Linnaeus University and the Swedish Social Insurance Inspectorate (ISF) are also gratefully acknowledged.
Johansson acknowledges the financial support from Forte Financial support (DNR 2013-2482)
b
Daniel Hallberg (corresponding author), the Swedish Social Insurance Inspectorate (ISF) and UCLS;
.
c
Per Johansson, the Department of Economics, Uppsala University, UCLS, IFAU, ISF and IZA;
.
d
Malin Josephson, the Swedish Social Insurance Inspectorate (ISF) and the Department of Medical Sciences,
University of Uppsala, Occupational and Environmental Medicine;
.
