Re-employment rate for eligible senior employees 'consistently high,' ministry says
Nearly all resident professionals, managers, executives, and technicians (PMETs) who reached statutory retirement age have been offered re-employment, according to the Ministry of Manpower (MOM).
MOM said that in 2022 and 2023, about 98% of resident PMETs who reached the retirement age were offered re-employment.
But the ministry “does not collect PMET-specific data on the reasons why workers are not offered re-employment," it said in a statement.
According to the ministry, the re-employment rate for all eligible senior workers has remained "consistently high" since the introduction of re-employment policy in 2021.
Among all senior workers who were not offered re-employment in the previous year, eight in 10 of them did not want to continue working. Others were not offered re-employment due to:
- Lack of suitable vacancies
- Employees did not meet work performance requirements
- Employees did not meet requirements on medical fitness
"MOM monitors the re-employment rate of eligible seniors annually," the ministry said. "Where relevant, we will consider highlighting noteworthy trends in our annual publications."
Retirement, re-employment rules
Singapore's current retirement age is at 63 years old, while re-employment age is at 68 years old.
The state's Retirement and Re-employment Act mandates employers to offer re-employment to eligible employees who turn 63 to 68 in their current organisation.
The policy was implemented to help older workers who wish to continue working as long as they remain willing and able, according to MOM.
"Employers are not allowed to dismiss any employee based on an employee's age," it added.
Last March, the Ministry of Manpower announced that it will hike the retirement age to 64 and the re-employment age to 69 in 2026.
The hike is a step close to the government's vision of increasing the retirement age to 65 and re-employment age to 70 by 2030.
