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Title: Delaying Retirement to Pay for College

Citation Type: Journal Article

Publication Year: 2011

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Abstract: Does sending children to college affect the contemporaneous labor supply of older workers? Drawing on biennial waves of the Health and Retirement Survey from 19922006, the author tracks the labor supply of parents before and after they send their children to college and shows that parents delay retirement while they are financing their childrens college education. Controlling for the total number of children who ever attend college and the total numberof those whose college expenses are paid for by older parents, she finds that mothers and fathers are more likely to be working (by 10.5 percentage points for fathers and by 6.9 percentage points for mothers), less likely to becollecting Social Security benefits, and less likely to report that they are retired if they are currently paying for a childs college education. Of those working, there is little evidence that paying for a childs education has anyimpact on work intensity.

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Authors: Weber Handwerker, Elizabeth

Periodical (Full): Industrial and Labor Relations Review

Issue: 5

Volume: 64

Pages: 921-945

Data Collections: IPUMS CPS

Topics: Aging and Retirement, Education

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