Andy Tullis / The BulletinMark Lindner uses a computer to look up research books requested by a student. Lindner, 55, is a part-time librarian at the Barber Library at Central Oregon Community College. He was unable to find full-time work in Bend.

Mark Lindner knew he might have problems finding a job when he moved to Bend three years ago.

But he didn’t count on the only work he could find being a part-time job that had him working seven hours a week.

“I’m not really looking (for a full-time job) but I am looking,” said Lindner, 55, who like thousands of other younger baby boomers have figured out a way he can survive on just his spouse’s income and has for the time being abandoned his search for a full-time job.

A recent report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics shows the average national unemployment rate for 55- to 64-year-olds has fallen steadily over the past four years and is almost half what it was in 2010. Oregon’s unemployment rate followed a similar trajectory over this time period, according to the state’s Employment Department.

But a new report issued by AARP’s Public Policy Institute finds that beyond these statistics lies two troubling facts: First, both the state and the country have seen continued decreases in their workforce participation rates for older people. Workforce participation rates measure the number of people who have a job or are looking for work. Second, it can now take more than a year for the average 55- to 64-year-old to find a new job.

Though some older workers are struggling, one Bend-based career counselor said others have found a way to make a fresh start and get back into the workforce even though the odds might seem to be stacked against them.

“At the higher-income, higher-education level, what I’m seeing is a rebirth,” said Kathy Hoyt, who has helped older workers start their own businesses in the region’s entrepreneurial climate and helped others switch career fields completely.

The statistics

After serving in the U.S. Army for 20 years, Lindner went to the University of Illinois to get his master’s degree in library science in 2006. He worked on a contract basis with a library in Sioux City, Iowa, for two years while his wife, Sara Thompson, worked at Briar Cliff University and moved to Bend in 2012 when she got a job working at OSU-Cascades.

“I went to graduate school to be a full-time librarian and retire as a full-time librarian… but that didn’t happen,” said Lindner, who hasn’t been able to find a full-time job since he came to Central Oregon because there aren’t many openings in his field.

He started the part-time job, where he works seven hours a week as a reference librarian at Central Oregon Community College, in January 2013.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Oregon Employment Department, more than 7 percent of Americans between 55 and 64 and 9 percent of Oregonians in this age group were out of a job and actively looking for work after the Great Recession ended in 2010.

These numbers have fallen by more than 40 percent over the past four years, and at the end of 2014, the national unemployment rate for this age group was 4.3 percent, while the state’s was 5.1 percent.

One reason for this decrease could be that fewer people in this age group are actively looking for work if they don’t have a job. That’s especially the case in Oregon, where the workforce participation rate for 55- to 64-year-olds fell from 66.6 percent in 2010 to 62.5 percent in 2014.

The national workforce participation rate fell from 64.9 percent to 64.1 percent over this four-year period.

“Labor force withdrawal is far less common for displaced workers between the ages of 55 and 64 (than it is for those 65 or older),” Sarah Rix with the AARP Public Policy Institute wrote in a January report about the labor market for older adults. “However, they are nonetheless more likely than prime age workers to exit (the workforce).”

Rix’s report also found the number of people who were 55 or older and said they wanted a job but were currently not taking part in the workforce grew from 826,000 when the Great Recession started in December 2007 to 1.7 million in December 2014. The percentage of people in this age group who were working a part-time job due to economic reasons climbed from 2.4 percent to 4.2 percent during this period.

Finding opportunity?

Hoyt, the career counselor, said these statistics can seem depressing because it is not the atmosphere that baby boomers grew accustomed to when they were growing up and just getting started with their careers.

“Our parents had one job until they were 65,” she said. “That’s not the way it is anymore.”

A September 2014 report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics found half of the country’s workers have been at their current jobs for more than five years. Workers who were between the ages of 25 and 44 spent an average tenure of three to five years working the same job whereas those 55 or older spent 10 or more years at the same employer, according to the report.

But rather than seeing these statistics as a deterrent, Hoyt sees them as an opportunity and said she has helped dozens of older Central Oregon residents make the transition from one career to another or start their own business from scratch.

“People are finding ways to cope in this economy,” Hoyt said, acknowledging she might have a selection bias because her services aren’t covered by most health insurance plans, as other counseling services might be, so the people she sees have enough money to pay for them out of pocket.

Hoyt said people need to come to terms with the fact they might have to change their career paths to find a new job in today’s market. That often means learning new skills, particularly when it comes to using social media, updating their resumes and improving their interview techniques.

Lindner said he’s also looking at making a career change — he’s interested in doing some work at a brewery, for example — even though he and his wife are comfortable where they are and he’s found several advantages to working a part-time job.

“If I found something that I liked, I’d do it full time,” he said. “We could use the extra money to say the least.”

— Reporter: 541-617-7816, mmclean@bendbulletin.com