Public opinion is seen as a major obstacle to changing the status quo of welfare state policies. Nevertheless some far reaching reforms have taken place, and welfare states in Europe changed at least gradually. Thus we can also ask the reverse question: have increased reform pressures and continued restructuring efforts led to changes in welfare attitudes? Research thus far has mainly focused on cross-country comparisons at one point in time. However, in order to answer this question we need to move beyond static comparisons across countries and to explore trends over time. This study examines the dynamics of attitudes toward increasing the retirement age in 25 European countries between 2004 and 2009. First the causal effect of a reform changing the legal retirement age on attitudes is examined. Raising the retirement age decreases the support for increasing the retirement age. Second, testing core assumptions of the power resources and new politics theory, I look at conflict lines within society and how they change in times of retrenchment. Both old and new cleavages structure the attitude patterns across European countries and seem to be more or less unaffected by reform pressures and restructuring. In summary reforms affect the level and only to a minor extent the pattern of attitudes. As groups within society seem to move in parallel over time cleavages remain unchanged.
