%0 Report
        %A Kraats, Coen van de
%A Galama, Titus
%A Lindeboom, Maarten
%A Deng, Zichen
        %T Why Life Gets Better After Age 50, for Some: Mental Well-Being and the Social Norm of Work
        %D 2024
        %8 2024 Dec
        %I Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        %C Bonn
        %7 IZA Discussion Paper
        %N 17586
        %U https://www.iza.org/publications/dp17586
        %X We provide evidence that the social norm (expectation) that adults work has a substantial detrimental causal effect on the mental well-being of unemployed men in mid-life, as substantial as, e.g., the detriment of being widowed. As their peers in age retire and the social norm weakens, the mental well-being of the unemployed improves. Using data on individuals aged 50+ from 10 European countries, we identify the social norm of work effect using exogenous variation in the earliest eligibility age for old-age public pensions across countries and birth cohorts.
        %K mental well-being
%K social norm of work
%K retirement institution