Retirement has traditionally been seen as the beginning of old age. It has been depicted as mandatory expulsion from the workforce and seen to mark the transition to a period of ill health and poverty. Such ideas and associations are however being challenged in the developed world by socio-demographic changes in retirement and old age. People in the United Kingdom as elsewhere are living longer and healthier lives, and many older people have access to non-state incomes that afford them a reasonable standard of living in retirement. There is however still concern that inequalities persist into old age. Data from two waves of the British Whitehall II study have been used to assess the relative effects of occupational grade, psychological and general health during working life, and retirement patterns or pathways on activities, attitudes to health and income in retirement. The results show that the majority of the sample reported good health, financial security and overall satisfaction with life, but with observable inequalities. Regression analyses demonstrate that pre-retirement circumstances generally had a greater effect on later life than the retirement route or pathway. Retirement no longer represents a drastic break between working and post-work life but rather, the results suggest, there are continuities between the two periods. It is concluded that the main causes of inequalities in retirement are work-based rather than in retirement itself.

This paper presents key findings of a recently completed socio-legal study of international retirement migration in the European Union (EU). It highlights the diverse nature of retirement migration and the differential citizenship status that is formally granted to various groups of retired migrants. ‘Citizenship of the European Union’ (Articles 17–22 of the Treaty establishing the European Community) bestows important social and political rights on nationals of EU Member States (‘Community nationals’). These rights are not, however, universal or based on nationality as such. In practice, the residency and social rights that a mobile EU national can claim in another Member State depend on the type of social contribution they have made and their personal relationships. Contributions through paid employment and/or membership of the family of a mobile EU worker gives rise to maximum social benefit. Whilst the European Union citizenship provisions extend residency rights to all EU nationals (irrespective of work status), those whose mobility is not connected to employment derive significantly inferior social entitlements when resident in a host Member State. Put simply, the rights of people (and members of their family) who move following retirement in their home country differ substantially from those who retire following a period of working in another Member State (and achieve the status of ‘community migrant worker’ prior to retirement). This formal ‘discrimination’ is further compounded by the diversity of the social welfare systems of the member states that results in distinct social, economic and spatial inequalities across the EU. To that extent, the ‘choice’ of retirement location significantly impacts on citizenship status. However, retired migrants are not merely passive spectators of formal rights and policies. Many show considerable skill in actively managing their rights (at both national and EU levels) and other resources to optimise personal benefit. This ability to maximise wellbeing is unevenly distributed.

This article analyses the determinants of the quality of life in a sample of 600 people aged 60 or more years living in deprived areas of three English cities. Data were collected by means of a face-to-face administered questionnaire. Two standardised measures, the ‘Satisfaction With Life Scale’ (SWLS) and the ‘Philadelphia Geriatric Center Morale Scale’ (PGCMS), and a single-item question were used to produce outcome measures of the quality of life. Using a conceptual model of quality of life factors, 21 socio-demographic, objective and subjective variables were correlated with each of the measures. Thirteen of these variables were subsequently entered in three multiple regression models. Subjective variables correlated significantly with all three quality of life measures, but socio-demographic and objective life condition variables correlated less strongly. Regression analysis revealed perception of own health, perceived ability to cope financially, perception of poverty over time and loneliness to be important determinants of the quality of life across all three quality of life measures. Variables that described characteristics of the urban environment had limited direct influence on the quality of life. The findings support the conceptual framework and highlight the key role played by subjective variables in determining the quality of life of older people in deprived urban areas.