Are Women Willing to Delay Their Retirement? A Research on 270 Female Teachers in Inner Mongolia of China

Abstract

Women’ retirement age is earlier than men in China, which has a negative effect on the problem-solving of aging society and the protection of women’s rights and interests. Therefore, prolonging the retirement age for women has become an important policy choice to alleviate the above problems. But are women themselves willing to delay their retirement? What factors effect women’s intention to delay their retirement? Those should be an important basis for the decision-making of a new retirement policy. This paper explores female delayed retirement intention by selecting the group of female teachers which is an important category of professional women in China. Taking 270 female teachers in Inner Mongolia of China as samples, this paper analyzes the effect of personal, occupational, and policy factors on female teachers’ delayed retirement intention. The results show that the health, children, monthly income, cumulative length of working, professional title and work units have a statistically significant impact on female teachers’ delayed retirement intention. Accordingly, this article puts forward policy implications on gender equity including eliminating the gender difference of retirement age, making flexible retirement policy and protecting women’s occupational interests.