Portugal

This chapter addresses the topic of extended working lifeWorking life from a gender-sensitive perspective, through a discussion of employment and working patterns, careCaring, care, caregiving arrangements, healthHealth issues, the pension system, employment policiesEmployment policy andPolicy/ies employment other relevant public policiesPolicy/ies public in PortugalPortugal . Concerning employment patternsEmployment patterns , PortugalPortugal is similar to the ‘NordicWages universal universalUniversal breadwinner model’, as both women and menMen tend to work on a full-time and continuous basis throughout their lifecourse. From 2002 onwards, the legislated pensionable age has been rising andRetirement early early retirementEarly retirement was increasingly penalisedPenalised until the mid-2010s. Active labour market policiesActive labour market policies , such as the transition to more flexible forms of work, the possibility to accumulateAccumulate pensions and wages, incentives to the hiring ofWorker older older workersOlder workers , or promotion of lifelong learningLife-long learning are examples of current policies, although they seem to have been insufficient or largely ineffective so far. In PortugalPortugal , as elsewhere in Europe, women live longer than menMen but have higher rates of morbidity and functional limitations in old age. This implies that it is more difficult for women, on average, to keep working until a later age. Equity in promoting good healthHealth is explicitly assumed as an objective of national healthHealth programmes.