Late career participation of late retirees in the age of the silver tsunami: understanding the influencing mechanism of health status and employment-based health insurance participation

BACKGROUND: The delayed retirement initiative and population aging have led to a growing group of late retirees. However, it remains unclear whether the existing employment-based health insurance system can effectively match the recently proposed initiative and support late retirees, especially those with pre-existing function limitations. Thus, this study aims to investigate the influencing mechanism of China’s Urban Employee Basic Medical Insurance (UEBMI), physical functioning limitation (PFL) and difficulty in instrumental activities of daily living (IADLs) on labour participation of late retirees in China. METHODS: This study uses data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS) survey, which tracks the quality of life among older adults in China (valid sample size = 5560). RESULTS: Empirical results show that China’s employment-based health insurance (i.e. UEBMI) and health conditions (i.e. PFL and difficulty in IADLs) are positively associated with late retirees’ withdrawal from late career participation. In addition, a higher level of difficulty in IADLs could strengthen the effect of PFL on late retirees’ withdrawal from late career participation, which could be further buffered by UEBMI beneficiary status. CONCLUSION: In the formulation of delayed retirement policies, it is necessary to consider the influencing mechanism of the social health insurance system and health conditions on late career participation of older workers to ensure policy effectiveness.