The Impact of Life Trajectories on Retirement: Socioeconomic Differences in Social Support Networks (original) (raw)

In general, the literature about social support networks (SSNs) has been divided into two different statements: On the one hand, social support is a safety net that helps the ego confront disadvantages in life. On the other hand, studies have shown how SSNs could act as sources of constraints for ego, especially in poverty. In this study, we looked into the SSNs of older people over time and found how those two paths co‐exist and depend on the socioeconomic status of ego. Then, this article aims to discover how cumulative social inequalities intersect with social networks in facilitating or hampering social support over time, impacting retirement experience. Specifically, we want to observe if and how the life trajectories of older people from different socioeconomic statuses affect how people build their SSNs in terms of structure and composition. This article presents a mixed‐method project that collected qualitative life history interviews from 30 older women and men in Santiago,...