Ingress: Värnamo kommun har hamnat i en rävsax till följd av de krav Svenska Fotbollsförbundet (SvFF) ställer på arenor för föreningar som når svensk elitfotboll. Antingen beslutar man om att starta arenabygget eller väljer att skjuta upp detta byggande tre år.

BACKGROUND: The ageing population has initiated a debate about a prolonged working life. There is an interest in finding the pre-retirement predictors of bridge employment and retirement decisions, but the understanding of the experiences of bridge employees is still limited.

OBJECTIVES: The aim was to describe the characteristics of the pensioners working for a staffing agency, their motivational aspects, work patterns and types of services they provided.

METHODS: This article analyses the results from a Swedish staffing agency's yearly co-worker questionnaire from December 2017. The response rate was 44% (N = 1741). The design is descriptive, with correlation analyses and construction of typical cases.

RESULTS: Most study participants were aged 65-74 years. Sixty-five percent were men, 66% were cohabitating/married, dominating education level was secondary school or higher education (79% ). Important incentives for working were the social context and to gain extra income. A majority of the respondents also stated that their work increased their overall well-being. Seventy-eight percent worked 25 hours per month or less, 37% wanted to work more, 3% wanted to work less. Private services dominated with 61% ; most common were gardening (43% ), trades (33%) and cleaning (31% ).

CONCLUSIONS: More men than women chose this form of work. While single women need to work out of economic necessity, men, to a larger extent, work for the social context and well-being. The highest work frequency in 2017 (14%) in the population was found for those who retired in 2015, i.e. two years after their retirement year. A majority indicated that the work they were doing was different from earlier in their working life.

During the industrialization period, the rate of workplace-related accidents increased. Because of the lack of public insurance, mutual health insurance societies became the main providers of workplace accident insurance among workers. Due to large differences in accident risk, health insurance societies were potentially exposed to the risk of adverse selection, since they employed equal pricing for all members regardless of risk profile. This article investigates the impact of workplace accident risk on health insurance selection and outcomes. We employ household budget surveys encompassing urban workers in Sweden during the early twentieth century. We find evidence for a redistribution from low- to high-risk-exposed workers, as workplace accident risk had a significant and positive impact on receiving health insurance benefits, also when controlling for a variety of factors. Workers exposed to greater risks in the workplace were more likely to have health insurance but did not pay higher premiums. The redistribution from low- to high-risk-exposed workers was largely accepted and viewed as an act of solidarity between workers. Given that health insurance societies were aware of this redistribution, we argue for the presence of informed, rather than adverse, selection.

Background: Demographic changes combined with costly technological progress put a financial strain on the healthcare sector in the industrialized world. Hence, there is a constant need to develop new cost-effective treatment procedures in order to optimize the use of available resources. As a response, the concept of a Mobile Geriatric Team (MGT) has emerged not only nationally but also internationally during the last decade; however, scientific evaluation of this initiative has been very scarce. Thus, the objective of this study was to perform a mixed methods analysis, including a prospective, controlled and randomized quantitative evaluation, in combination with an interview-based qualitative assessment, to measure the effectiveness and user satisfaction of MGT.

Materials and methods: Community-dwelling, frail elderly people were randomized to an intervention group (n=31, mean age 84) and a control group (n=31, mean age 86). A two-year retrospective quantitative data collection and a prospective one-year follow-up on healthcare utilization were combined with qualitative interviews. Non-parametric statistics and difference-in-difference (DiD) analyses were applied to the quantitative data. Qualitative data were analyzed using content analysis.

Results: No significant group differences in healthcare utilization were found before inclusion. Post intervention, primary care contact (including MGTs) increased for the MGT group. Inpatient care decreased dramatically for both groups. Hence, the increase in primary care contact for MGT patients was not accompanied by a reduction in inpatient care compared to the control group. Utilization of non-primary care was lower (p< 0.01) post-intervention in both groups.

Conclusion: There appears to be a “natural” variation in healthcare needs over time among frail elderly people. Hence, it is vital to perform open, controlled clinical studies in tandem with the implementation of new caregiving strategies. The MGT initiative was clearly appreciated but did not fully achieve the desired reduction in healthcare utilization in this study.

Trial registration: Retrospectively registered 09/10/2018, ClinicalTrials.gov ID NCT03662945.

Background: With a growing share of older people in almost every population, discussions are being held worldwide about how to guarantee welfare in the immediate future. Different solutions are suggested, but in this article the focus is on the need to keep older employees active in the labor market for a prolonged time.

Objective: The aim was to find out and describe the incentives at three system levels for older people 1) wanting, 2) being able, and 3) being allowed to work.

Material: The literature search embraced articles from the databases Scopus, PsycInfo, Cinahl, AgeLine and Business Source Premier, from May 2004 until May 2016. After the removal of 507 duplicates, the selection and analysis started with the 1331 articles that met the search criteria. Of these, 58 articles corresponded with the research questions.

Method: The design was a ‘scoping review’ of the research area bridge employment and prolonged work life.

Results: The results show that most investigations are conducted on individual-level predictors, research on organizational-level predictors is more scattered, and societal-level predictor information is scarce.

Conclusions: Attitudes and behavior according to a prolonged work life could be summarized as dependent on good health, a financial gain in combination with flexible alternative working conditions.

We analyze the earnings penalty of smoking among Swedish twins in two social contexts: the 1970s, when smoking was common and widely accepted and when there were relatively few tobacco laws aiming to reduce smoking; and the 2000s, when smoking had become more expensive, stigmatizing and less common, and when tobacco laws and regulations had intensified. The results show that the short-term earnings penalty of smoking was much higher in the 21st century than in the 1970s for men. For women, smokers had on average higher annual earnings compared to nonsmokers in the 1970s, but lower annual earnings in the 2000s. In the long run, there was an earnings gap for men between never-smokers and continuous smokers, whereas there was a pronounced earnings ‘bonus’ of smoking cessation for women. The results emphasize the importance of social context and the long-term horizon when evaluating the consequences of smoking for earnings.

Adult height is a function of genetic predispositions and environmental influences during childhood. Hence, any variation in height among monozygotic twins, who share genetic predispositions, is bound to reflect differences in their environmental exposure. Therefore, a height premium in earnings among monozygotic twins also reflects such exposure. In this study, we analyze the height premium over the life cycle among Swedish twins, 10,000 of whom are monozygotic. The premium is relatively constant over the life cycle, amounting to 5–6% higher earnings per decimeter for men and less for women, suggesting that environmental conditions in childhood and youth affect earnings over most of the adult life course. The premium is larger below median height for men and above median height for young women. The estimates are similar for monozygotic and dizygotic twins, indicating that environmentally and genetically induced height differences are similarly associated with earnings.

Previous research has shown considerable marriage premiums in earnings for men, but often penalties for women of being in a union. In this study we extend this research by analyzing how the age difference between spouses affects the earnings profiles by gender. As we follow people over time in advance as well as within their marriage, we can separate premarital from postmarital earnings movements. The data consist of information on annual earnings 1990-2009 for all Swedes born 1960-1974 (N = 926,219). The results indicate that age homogamy is related to higher earnings for both men and women, and that larger age differences are generally associated with lower union premiums, quite independently of which spouse is older. However, most of these results are explained by assortative mating, in which men and women with greater earnings potentials find partners of a similar age. Overall, the age difference between spouses seems to have a limited causal effect, if any, on individual earnings.