NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — Three jobs. That’s the new reality for many older workers.
Today, 115,000 people over the age of 55 are working three jobs, according to the Department of Labor.
That’s a 170% increase from 43,000 in 1994, when the government began keeping these records, and a 60% increase from before the Great Recession in 2006, when there were 73,000 older workers with three jobs.
At an age when they should be thinking about retirement, they are working harder and in more jobs, than ever.
Peggy Mangan knows that first hand. Even with three jobs she says she’s “just barely making it” in Beavercreek, Ohio.
The 58-year-old mother of four grown children, works as a full-time administrative assistant in the Beavercreek school system. To supplement her income, Mangan works Sundays and some Tuesday nights at the front counter in a local McDonald’s.
Other weeknights and on Saturday she manages the concession stand at the Beavercreek Soccer Association.
Mangan is part of the Baby Boomer generation, who has had it particularly rough since the recession.
Workers in their fifties are about 20% less likely than workers ages 25 to 34 to become re-employed, according to the Urban Institute.
It also takes a longer time for older workers to find a job.
Nearly two-thirds of unemployed workers age 55 and older said they were actively searching for a job for more than one year, compared to just one-third of younger workers, according to a survey by the Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers University.
