Is retirement bliss? Assessing the impact of retirement on subjective well-being in Russia

Retirement is a major life event affecting individuals’ time use, economic position, and social roles. Using data from the World Health Organization’s Study on Global Ageing and Adult Health (2007-2010), we examine the causal impact of retirement on subjective well-being in Russia. Exploiting sharp eligibility thresholds for old-age pensions, we compare the effects of retirement on evaluative and emotional dimensions of well-being for women and men. We find that retirement has no significant effect on evaluative well-being, while it leads to substantial improvements in emotional well-being, particularly among men. To shed light on the mechanisms underlying these patterns, we combine a control function approach with detailed time-use data and decompose changes in experienced well-being into time reallocation (“time composition”) effects and changes in activity-specific affect. Our results show that emotional gains from retirement are largely driven by shifts away from paid work toward activities associated with more positive affect, with markedly different patterns for men and women. Our study provides nuanced insights into the gender-specific effects of retirement on subjective well-being and provides policy-relevant insights for debates on increasing statutory retirement ages. JEL-Code : I310 ; J260 ; J140 ; J160