Harvard Leadership Dinner with Prof. Dr. h.c. Jutta Allmendinger: "For a new architecture of life courses- What we know, what we can do, what needs to be done"

The traditional three-step process of 1. preparation for gainful employment, 2. paid employment and 3. recovery after gainful employment strongly shapes our social system and cultural conceptions of the ideal life course. Deviations such as unemployment, raising children, caring for relatives or further education are often perceived as disruptive and lead to material disadvantages that are unequally distributed. Women, the poorly educated and people in demanding occupations are particularly affected.
This rigid structure ignores demographic changes such as the ageing population and the increasing proportion of people with a migration background. The traditional life course hinders innovation, restricts individual development opportunities and promotes social fragmentation. The integration of more flexible life courses that combine gainful employment with further education, care, voluntary work and other activities is becoming necessary. These adjustments are made possible by increased life expectancy in good health, which allows a more flexible approach to gainful employment and retirement. A new, more dynamic understanding of life courses is needed to promote a sustainable and healthy society.