Digital Transformation and the Ageing Workforce: Inequalities and Health Impacts Across Europe

This book emerges at a moment when Europe is confronting two profound and interconnected transformations: the digitalisation of work and the ageing of its workforce. Drawing on comparative insights from 22 European countries and the collaborative work of COST Action CA21107: “Work Inequalities in Later Life Redefined by Digitalisation”, the volume brings these developments into dialogue rather than treating them as separate policy or research concerns. It asks how digital change reshapes work inequalities, health, inclusion, and opportunity in later working life. Through an introductory chapter and 22 country chapters, the book offers a rich, context-sensitive account of how older workers experience digital transformation across diverse labour markets, institutions, and social settings. It synthesises existing knowledge on how work inequalities in later life are redefined by digitalisation, examines the impact of digitalised work environments on older workers’ health, and identifies best practices for understanding and overcoming digital challenges among older people across Europe. In doing so, the volume highlights both the risks of exclusion, technostress, and widening inequality, and the possibilities opened by inclusive technologies, lifelong learning, age-sensitive workplace design, and supportive public policies. It invites scholars, policymakers, employers, and practitioners to rethink digitalisation not only as a technological transition, but also as a social challenge that must be shaped deliberately to support fair, healthy, and sustainable working lives for all generations.

Sylwia Przytuła is Professor at the Faculty of Management, Wrocław University of Science and Technology, Poland. Her research interests include international HRM, academic expatriation, internationalisation of higher education, and mobility and migration. She has participated in numerous international study visits and internships for academics.

Cristina Maria Tofan is a scientific researcher and a lecturer professor at the “Gheorghe Zane” Institute for Economic and Social Research, Romanian Academy-Iasi Branch and the Department of Sociology, Social Work and Human Resources, Faculty of Philosophy and Social-Political Sciences, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University, Iasi (Romania). Currently she leads interdisciplinary research projects at the intersection of mental health, education, and digital technology.

Jeroen Spijker is a senior researcher at the Institute for Advanced Family Studies of the Universitat Internacional de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain, and an affiliated researcher at the Centre d’Estudis Demogràfics, Spain where he still co-leads the research lines “Health, Mortality and Causes of Death” and “Elderly Care”. He also co-leads with Tofan WG3 of the DIGI- net COST Action CA21107.

Jelle Lössbroek is a postdoctoral researcher at the Netherlands Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute and the University of Groningen. His research focuses on the labour market and related fields. He obtained his PhD degree in 2019 in Sociology at Utrecht University, the Netherlands, on a dissertation about personnel policies for older workers in nine European countries.

Nataliia Tkalenko holds a Doctor of Sciences in Economics and a PhD in Project Management. She is affiliated with the Department of Management at Mendel University in Brno, Czech Republic. Her research interests include the social and labour market implications of digitalisation, demographic change, lifelong learning, and sustainable workplaces. She has experience in interdisciplinary and international academic collaboration across research, teaching, and capacity-building in management, public administration, and digital transformation.