La regolazione del lavoro che invecchia: la rappresentanza dei lavoratori over 50 nei contratti collettivi in Italia

In the last twenty years, Italy has witnessed a large increase in employment of older workers. The number of employees over 50 doubled in twenty years: from 4.3 million in 2000 to 9 million in 2023. This trend does not result from greater demand for this kind of worker but depends mainly on population ageing and increasing pension age. In this new scenario, social partners can play a key role in developing an age-sensitive approach to the regulation of employee relations through sectoral bargaining. That is, an approach aimed at supporting the quality and productivity of employees over 50. The paper aims at verifying whether social partners have developed an age-sensitive approach to labour regulation by promoting measures and practices to increase the quality of employment of employees over 50. We analysed the 25 most important sectoral agreements (CCNL) in Italy by coverage. The contracts cover 1.6 million enterprises and 14.9 million workers, respectively, 77.2% and 72.5% of the total. We selected all the voluntaristic provisions specifically focusing on age. The results show that Italian social partners do not extensively deal with the potential risks and opportunities represented by prolonged working careers. Only 11 out of 25 CCNL contain age-related provisions, and no comprehensive approach regulating the consequences of the workforce ageing process has been found in any sectoral agreement. Clauses are mostly targeted to give a conceptual framework to guide employers and social partners in company bargaining. No mature older worker-focused clauses related to training, time flexibilization, work accommodation or workload reduction have been found in the agreements. Most importantly, when target mature workers, provisions aim at reducing older workers’ activity in preparation for retirement. On the other hand, intergenerational collaboration-related provisions assume mature worker turnover, e.g., in the case of intergenerational relay and knowledge transfer. The paper emphasizes that workforce ageing is a topic that is as relevant as it is neglected by collective bargaining in Italy. The postponement of the retirement age is a necessary but insufficient condition for the social partners to develop a specific attention to the working conditions of employees over 50.