
How IBM quietly pushed out 20,000 aging workers - Futurebot
https://www.vox.com/2018/4/20/17261798/ibm-layoffs-retirements-older-workers-age-discrimination-claims
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PeterStuer
Ageism is still the number 1 discrimination in the IT/software industry by a
mile. But since it is not as 'sexy', 'Politically Correct' or appealing to the
right 'Consumer Demographic', it gets mostly the silent treatment.

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Bombthecat
The amount ( two right now) is also telling a story about this topic...

The only place in see (more at least) old people is IT consulting. Might be
biased or just perception though.

~~~
mathattack
Some firms have a school bus model too there though.

I’ve found the way around age discrimination is to actively seek out older
bosses.

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TheRealDunkirk
As a late-40's engineer/programmer/admin, I've been fortunate to stay
technical for my 25 years or so, but I've seen the other side of this
argument. We had a guy who was in his later 50's, as a top-level "tech" pay
grade, who wrote some Perl twenty-something years ago. He was given 3 simple
tasks in Visual Basic, and couldn't complete a single one. The company did an
RIF, and he just barely made the cut to get an early retirement. He took it,
knowing he'd be let go if he didn't.

So, yeah, as a middle-aged guy, these stories scare my pants off. However, I
think this other guy's story is pretty common. I suspect that there are a lot
of people who, thanks to some early success at being technical in a large
company, rise through the pay scale, and then never update their skill set.
These people NEED to go. They're a drag on an already-cripplingly-
overencumbered organization.

You have to keep learning. Forever. After over a decade happily coding with
Rails, I'm now learning Java for web applications. Yikes. I can't say I'm
enjoying the experience, but I AM learning a lot.

Just throwing out a counterpoint. I'm not sure that taking the money saved,
and hiring a small army of Indian college grads is the answer, but that's a
whole different discussion.

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forinti
I find this funny because I've used Java most of my career and am just tired
of having to write so much code for even the simplest stuff. I just wish I
could use Perl always.

The latest task was a simple web service for a poc. Java was a pom file,
various classes, web.xml, etc. All that could be written as a Perl dancer app
and a yml database config file.

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mathattack
And I thought IBM was one of the few places that still had aging workers. Why
would a young worker ever join them?

The Voce article doesn’t add anything to the original.
[https://features.propublica.org/ibm/ibm-age-
discrimination-a...](https://features.propublica.org/ibm/ibm-age-
discrimination-american-workers/)

~~~
SahAssar
> And I thought IBM was one of the few places that still had aging workers.
> Why would a young worker ever join them?

Up until now, job safety. Now, I really don't know.

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mathattack
They haven’t had job security in decades. It’s just now more deliberate on the
oldsters.

They are a mature business. They are at a phase of giving money back to
shareholders, not inventing the next thing.

~~~
sjg007
Older folks cost more. This is all about money.

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sunstone
The problem with tech unlike say cardiology or law is that things change so
quickly that experience doesn't easily accrue as an asset. Further, because
tech is dealing with things rather than people a professional network also
isn't easy to build.

Compounding these problems is that the internet has allowed organizations to
relatively easily outsource a lot of tech work to low wage countries. The
combined result is that tech workers have little strength in the value chain
particularly as they get older.

One bright area though is tech for smaller companies typically web technology.
Small companies can't easily manage foreign workers and many are not large
enough to hire an IT department but they still need a web site and often and
specialized database backing it up. These types of businesses often appreciate
older workers as consultants and pay them well enough, almost like lawyers or
accountants.

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sjg007
I hope IBM gets roasted by the Feds for this.

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datamingle
Could this not be more with Pensions than just ageism? I'm going to make the
assumption that perhaps older IBM workers had generous pension packages. Human
living longer, more costly, etc.

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bornonline1
So there are no studies that show the elder lose their mental abilities?

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ta3747484
You'll be there one day, and may you receive the same level of empathy.

~~~
ChrisLomont
While empathy is nice, companies are not retirement homes. Empathy does not
pay bills.

If employees don't add enough value to justify their cost then eventually the
company fails, costing everyone, not just the old or unproductive.

