The OECD announced the launch of a “Longevity Readiness Tool” in May to help keep us all living and working longer.
The OECD has 38 member countries, including Israel, so this probably applies to you too.
Background: By 2060, one out of three people in OECD countries will be at least 65 years old, up from one out of five today, according to the OECD. Older workers already make a major contribution to labor markets, bringing experience and company‑specific knowledge that support continuity, mentoring, and productivity.
Careers can now span several decades, with up to five generations working side by side.
Nevertheless, many workplace practices are still built for much shorter careers. The result? Skills shortages, lost experience, and people leaving work earlier than they need or want to.
In response, the OECD has created the Longevity Readiness Tool to help organizations “stay ahead of the curve.”
How the Longevity Readiness Tool works: Firstly, an organization (companies and other bodies) fills in a questionnaire to help assess its longevity readiness. The responses to the questionnaire will generate insights that the organization can then use to compare its longevity practices against others in the same sector , country, and other OECD countries for which data is available.In short, the tool provides a statistical picture of how well an organization is prepared for longer working lives and where targeted action can drive retention, productivity, and long-term resilience.
Longevity factors include: recruitment and retention, training, health and safety, and job quality
The longevity factors the tool focuses on include recruitment and retention, training, health and safety, and job quality.
Recruitment and retention: Tight labor markets mean organizations cannot afford to overlook experienced talent. As workforces age, employers will rely more on experienced workers to fill roles, transfer knowledge, and maintain productivity.
Yet many are lost too early: Only about half of workers aged 55-59 stay with the same employer more than five years, and age bias in hiring continues to narrow the talent pool unnecessarily.
Small changes in recruitment can make a big difference. Age-neutral job ads, skills-based selection, and flexible entry routes widen the talent pool without lowering performance.
The tool looks at whether your recruitment practices value experience, reduce age bias, and open pathways to talent at every career stage.
Training: Longer careers depend on continuous learning, yet training too often slows or stops with age.
As working lives extend, skills need to be updated, redeployed, and renewed at every stage of a career. When access to learning declines later in working life, skills gaps widen, adaptability falls, and productivity suffers for both individuals and organizations.
The tool looks at how organizations support learning across the full career span. Strong learning systems keep people productive and adaptable across longer careers. They also give employers the agility to respond to shifting skill demands and close workforce gaps before they become critical.
Poor job quality often forces early exit
Job quality: Even when people can and want to work longer, poor job quality often forces early exit.
How work is designed shapes whether longer careers are sustainable. High work intensity, limited flexibility, low autonomy, and poor work-life balance erode health, motivation, and performance over time, and ultimately push experienced workers out the door earlier than planned.
The business cost is high and includes lost productivity, higher turnover, and a shrinking pool of experienced talent.
The tool focuses on how work is organized and experienced, including workload, flexibility, autonomy, work-life balance, and opportunities for meaningful contribution. It identifies whether jobs are structured to sustain long, productive careers, or whether design gaps are quietly driving talent out.
Health and safety: Good health is a prerequisite for longer working lives, and workplace practices play a critical role in maintaining it.
While people are living longer and healthier lives overall, work-related health risks continue to shape labor-market exit at older ages, representing a preventable loss of experience and productivity for employers. Across OECD countries, health problems are one of the leading reasons people leave work before retirement age, particularly after age 55.
Proactive health and safety practices benefit workers of all ages while reducing turnover, sickness absence, and the premature loss of the most experienced people.
Comments: Using the OECD Longevity Readiness Tool is like honoring your parents. It is about honoring the more experienced personnel in a company or other organization to achieve a win-win situation for them and the employing company. May you live and work to 120 if you so desire.
As always, consult experienced professional advisers in each country concerned at an early stage in specific cases.
The writer is a certified public accountant and tax specialist at Harris Consulting & Tax Ltd.