Women Still at Work: Professionals Over Sixty and On the Job

by Elizabeth F. Fideler

From Betty White to Toni Morrison, we’re surrounded by examples of women working well past the traditional retirement age. In fact, the fastest growing segment of the workforce is women age sixty-five and older. Women Still at Work tells the everyday stories of hard-working women and the reasons they’re still on the job, with a focus on women in the professional workforce. The book is filled with profiles of real women, working in settings from academia to drug and alcohol rehabilitation centers, from business to the arts, talking about the many reasons why they still work and the impact work has on their lives.

Women Still at Work draws on national survey data and in-depth interviews, showing not only the big picture of older women advancing their careers despite tough economic conditions, but also providing the personal insights of everyday working women from all parts of the country. Their stories showcase some of the key themes women choose to stay at work—including job satisfaction, diminishing retirement savings, the need to support children or parents longer in life, exercising the hard-won right to work, and more. Women Still at Work shows employment to be a positive and rewarding part of life for many women well beyond the expected retirement age.

220 pages, Hardcover

First published June 16, 2012

About the author

Elizabeth F. Fideler, EdD is a research fellow at the Center on Aging & Work at Boston College. After several years of classroom teaching in the Framingham, MA Public Schools, she earned a doctorate in Administration, Planning, and Social Policy from Harvard University. She continued working for many years as an education researcher and senior manager in non-profit organizations.

Her primary research and writing interests focus on older women and men who choose to continue in the paid work force beyond conventional retirement age.

Women Still at Work—Professionals Over Sixty and On the Job (2012) is available from Rowman & Littlefield Publishing: https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781442215504. Note: Look for the paperback edition in November-December 2017.

Men Still at Work—Professionals Over Sixty and On the Job (2014) is
available from Rowman & Littlefield Publishing: https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781442222755.

Currently she is working on a biography of Margaret Pearmain Welch (1893-1984), Proper Bostonian, activist, pacifist, reformer, and preservationist and longtime resident of Louisburg Square and Framingham, Massachusetts.

Dr. Fideler is an elected member of the Framingham Public Library’s Board of Trustees. She chairs the Library’s bi-annual “one book, one community initiative,” Framingham Reads Together, which brought author David McCullough to Framingham in May 2016.

Dr. Fideler can be reached at lizpaulfideler@mindspring.com and on Facebook and LinkedIn. She is an experienced presenter and the author of numerous articles and reports.

Reviews

[Christine · Rating 3 out of 5]

I still have a couple of years to go before reaching the eponymous milestone, but the possibility of working into my sixties (and beyond?!?) is definitely on my mind these days.

Fideler combines research into national employment data with personal profiles to create a book that offers interesting statistical trends with inspiring (and occasionally daunting) stories of women who continue their careers well past the typical retirement age. While the profiles tend to highlight professional women with careers that continue to feel satisfying across the decades, the data shows that most women work because they have to, to survive economically. Some of the women Fideler profiles are real stand-outs with notable lists of achievements and activities--they made me feel like a bit of a slacker. Shouldn't I be doing more?

The take-away is that there are exciting possibilities out there for older women. The key is shaping a career that's remunerative, interesting, and extensible across the decades.

I don't read enough non-fiction (more evidence of the slacker in me, I guess), but this was definitely a worthwhile and thought-provoking read.

[Stephanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well-written, but survey did not include a sufficient percentage of minorities nor poorly-educated women. Many women remain in education past 60, especially higher-ed and adult-ed. Some are authors, artists. Others work in paid philanthropic or social action. A small percentage in business. Computer and resume help is needed in public libraries, as well as literacy and adult education. Some mentor and co-author. Opportunities for training, retraining, and updating skills appear to be minor reasons for continuing to work into one's senior years. One interesting woman was single, never married and was working on a doctorate degree. That was inspirational.

"If you teach a boy, you educate an individual ; but if you teach a girl, you educate a community." proverb quoted by Greg Mortenson in Three cups of Tea and Stones into Schools

[Peg · Rating 1 out of 5]

The title held promise. In my estimation, the book did not deliver. Didn't finish book.