I work for LinkedIn, a company that is extremely interested in advancing your career. We offer networking, personal growth tips, education and resume guidance. Recruiters without a LinkedIn membership aren't serious about recruiting and if you don't have a LinkedIn profile, you aren't serious about a career in technology. LinkedIn is all about improving your current job ... or helping you with your next play.

But there's a problem

LinkedIn ignores the end-of-career employee.* Study the chart to the left - it represents the United States workforce by age. Approximately 20% of the workforce is 25 to 34 years old. That 20% is consistent through the ages of 25 to about 60 years of age, after which it slowly drops to 6% at 65 years of age.

Here's an interesting thought. Apply it to your current age...

The median age of the Uni﻿ted States workforce is forty-two years old.

If we typically retire at 65, then many of us are halfway through our careers. In fact, there are just as many of us on the "down-side" of our careers as there are on the "up-side." If you are forty-two or older, should you be planning for career advancement or retirement? Just as important; what should employers be doing with career planning for the older employee? Should they be coaching employees to advance in their careers or helping them find ways of gracefully disengaging?

Traditional career guidance is to strive towards more income, increased job satisfaction, and skills improvement. Retirement advice is almost always couched in terms of financial planning. Corporate advancement plans always move up-and-to-the-right. Which matches the expectations of anyone younger than forty-two.

Our culture provides a limited number of career pockets; student, unemployment, part-time, full-time, freelance, retirement. Each pocket has an associated compensation and benefits package. Moving from one pocket to another is precipitous. Moving from full-time work to part-time usually means loss of health care benefits and dependable salary. What would employment past forty-two look like if this transition wasn't so abrupt? What if we could plan our career lifecycle just like we plan a product lifecycle?

(If you'd like an alarming example of our cultural bias, try googling the phrase "career end of life." Less alarming is the google results for "smooth transition into retirement.")

Career Transition Past Forty-Two: Worse, and Better

Before the median age of forty-two, we enthusiastically talk about our "next play." Our future is so bright, we have to wear shades. After forty-two, the prospects change. Boston College did some research that I've summarized in this chart. In short, changing jobs after 50 will probably result in:

Worse: Lower earnings and worse healthcare. Your economic security will take a hit.

Lower earnings and worse healthcare. Your economic security will take a hit. Better: Less Stress and less physical work. Working conditions, not compensation, may trigger voluntary job changes for older workers.

The research makes an interesting conclusion: on average, workers who change jobs between ages 50 and 60 are significantly more likely to still be working by 65 and 67 in comparison to those who stay in the job they held at age 50. In short:

Change your job after 50 and you'll probably have a longer career

If the job change is involuntary (aka laid off, "riffed" or fired), older workers are much less likely to find a new job. If reemployed, they are more likely to have significantly lower wages than in their original job and are twice as likely to retire by any given age. Involuntary job loss, unsurprisingly, seems to be universally bad for older workers.

Workers who voluntarily change jobs generally report lower stress and greater job satisfaction.

Two things you can do now:

Consider the long tail of your career. If you're younger than forty-two, climb that career ladder. If you're older than forty-two, consider what you'll do when you get to the end of the ladder. Will you just fall off - or do you have some sort of plan for a graceful transition? Career preparation after forty-two looks different than when you were younger. Are you willing to accept more stress for higher pay? That's not necessarily a bad choice, but it is a choice. How will you adjust your skill set? Do you want to prepare to be a manager or an individual contributor? What do you need to learn now to make that happen later?

* Opinions expressed are solely my own and do not express the views or opinions of my employer. The employees of LinkedIn are a glorious mix of perspectives and opinions. I would be out-of-line to imply I speak for anyone but myself.