Have you faced "age discrimination" at work (employees, average, alternative)

[Dennis P]

Originally Posted by nebulous1

I was once between jobs and I went to a headhunting agency in town. It was one of those big shot places in a glass castle type of building.
I was put in a large conference room with a woman, maybe 40 to 45 years.
She had on a suit and looked at me and said "Your resume looks too well-seasoned"
I said, "What?"
She said, "Welll, it makes you look old."
I said, "Isn't that discriminatory?"
She said, "Oh, employers want younger workers."
I said, "I agree, because they want to pay less."
She said, "No, because younger workers are better workers than older workers."
I wished I had had a tape recorder.
I said, "So you generalize like that about everyone/"
She said, "No,but take all the dates off your resume."
I said,'"When I fill out an application, they will want dates to verify employment"
She said, "I can't get you a job, if you have dates going back past 10 years."
I never met such a hostile person. I said, "This isn't for me."
And I left and on the way out, I saw that they were a minority recruiting firm.

What a horrible interview with such a horrible recruiter! I don't blame you for getting up and walking out. I would have done the same thing!

I had a similar experience, only I never was in a face-to-face interview with the recruiter. This happened after I was laid off right before the 9/11/2001 terrorist attacks back east. I posted my resume online and a recruiter (a woman) from this agency calls me in response to it. She proceeds to pick apart my resume, telling me things that I shouldn't include on it and such. I got the very distinct impression she really didn't want to help me find a job, and I got angry and told her, "It sounds like you'd rather criticize my resume than help me get an interview." Then I hung up on her.

[charolastra00]

Being a 19 year old college student trying to find meaningful work, it's also very difficult. Over the summer, I was working as an intern 3 days a week for no pay. My boyfriend at the time hooked me up with a temp service he had luck with. The experience was awful. I went in completely professional and was broken apart piece by piece for being young. They told me that they could not find me work because no one would want to hire someone who had no idea what responsibility was.

I only wished I could show them my financial records because I've never once been late for a bill, I always pay the full balance, and I'm almost completely self sufficient (with the exception of money my grandfather gives me in lieu of the scholarship money I saved him for my college tuition that I use only for my numerous medical bills). It's really frustrating because while I might not be supporting a family, it does not mean I am any less responsible or hard working than the next person.

[stock66]

I found the hardest time to get a job was when I was in my 20's. I had one one guy start asking me all sorts of questions about if I had children, when I was going to have them, etc. I finally stopped him and said "look we both know I am not going to get this job, but you should be aware that the questions you are asking are illegal." It was great to see him go pale and realize his screw up! I would count this towards sexism rather than age related. I am sure he would have been happy to find a male in his 20's with a child to support!
Once I got past my mid 30's getting jobs has been easy. I think employers find this age range fairly stable (I am being extremely general here) just because if we have kids they are a bit older and we tend to have bills.
Not sure how things will go in my 50's. I hear from friends it gets much harder to find work then.

[stock66]

Originally Posted by charolastra00

Being a 19 year old college student trying to find meaningful work, it's also very difficult. Over the summer, I was working as an intern 3 days a week for no pay. My boyfriend at the time hooked me up with a temp service he had luck with. The experience was awful. I went in completely professional and was broken apart piece by piece for being young. They told me that they could not find me work because no one would want to hire someone who had no idea what responsibility was.

Maybe it would help to look for direct employment? My daughter just turned 20 and has had great success finding jobs. When potential employers hear that she is paying her own way through college they seem to view her as quite responsible. Do you have previous job experience?

[NYSD1995]

Originally Posted by goodtype

Where are the baby boomers in today's workplace? I see a few but not many! Have they been put out to pasture?

Not at all.

They're either:
- retired
- senior management, VP's, CEO's etc...
- semi-retired, working part-time for fun or health benefits

I mentioned this in another thread - your age and work level are typically correlated. Young people work in entry-level jobs, older people are in more senior jobs. An older person trying to get an entry-level job is a bit of a red flag for most employers.

[Huckleberry3911948]

there is probably speed discrimination and pay discrimination there is excess knowledge discrimination but actul age wrinkles and fat, not as much as we old guys may think.
being a temp is very very rough been there done that. i wish you the best and that you can get out of the cold and the wind as soon as possible. vocational training to get into a sure thing? nursing?? just asking.

[cricket_factor]

Originally Posted by goodtype

As a temp I get to see alot of different workplaces. One thing that seems to be quite common in every place I work is a very young work place. Being just over 50 years old, I seem to be always the oldest worker in the office. It makes it hard to have much in common with the people I work around. It seems like everyone who is hired is 25-40. I do not see anyone my age ever being hired unless it is for a very senior management position.

Where are the baby boomers in today's workplace? I see a few but not many! Have they been put out to pasture?

I'm 49, a legal clerk, and one of the youngest people in my office (I work in a legal department for a city). Finally, they hired a 36 year-old attorney for the vacant position in our office.

The workplace I am in is full of Boomers in all departments; a few Gen Xers in the IT department and a few in customer service. But mostly Boomers.

Your view on the workplace is the reverse of mine - I've been wondering when I'm going to meet up with a lot of Gen Xers and Millenials.

When I worked at the courthouse, there was half Boomers and half Generation X working there.

I recently interviewed with an aerospace company and attended its job fair - again, mostly boomers.

[Dedalus]

I've been looking for work for months, and "too old" and "overqualified" are constant subtexts in my interviews.

[Prettygyrl777]

Yes, age discrimination goes both ways. When I was first hired for my position, many of the parents couldn't understand that I would be counseling their children. They expected an older (perhaps wiser) person who had years of experience in the field. When I would show up to parent meetings or perform the intake interview, I was often mistaken for a 'representative' of the counseling service. Out of the group that I work with, I'm the youngest (the next youngest is 47). I've been at it now for a few years and I still get asked about my credentials. Yikes.

[mookarenmoo]

And for every one of the older workers experiencing discrimination, a younger worker does as well.

I'm 23; I've been at my current job for 3 years now.

We'll start with finding this job; I went on many, many interviews, only to get turned down for almost every job I applied for. I had the skills and I had the credentials, but people took one look at me, found out I was 20 years old (I had to put it on my application), and never called me back. I even had 1 potential employer flat-out tell me that his experience with young people is that we were lazy and didn't want to work (that is not me at all--I lived on my own starting at age 18).

I finally got hired at an insurance agency, and everyone but myself who works there is over 50. Now don't get me wrong, I appreciate their expertise and knowledge, but both of my other co-workers (one gets paid 2x more than me, the other gets paid $5.00 an hour more than me) are technologically inept (they can hardly send an e-mail!). Neither of them can do half the stuff that needs done, and it all gets dumped on me, since I know how.

But, when it comes review time, the boss just says "well, you're young". I guess I'm too young for a raise!

For the record, I'm looking for other work, but I'm experiencing the same walls as last time.

It's downright sad that employers will look past your knowledge, skills and expertise and pay you solely based on your calendar age.