
Ageism: a worsening epidemic - hwstar
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/oped/bs-ed-ageism-20160106-story.html
======
jayess
The unemployment rate of those 55+ is 3.2% while the rate for those 20-24 is
9.4%. God help you if you're a teen, where the unemployment rate is 16.1%.

[http://www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cpseea10.htm](http://www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cpseea10.htm)

~~~
hwstar
While I suppose if you were forced to take any job, then those figures would
hold. As for myself, I've found it next to impossible to get even an interview
as a hardware engineer. Yes, I suppose I stayed a little too long at one
company (26 years) and the company was failing towards the end of my tenure.

The point is, I posted this here because the problem is even more acute with
technical employment.

~~~
seangrant
How public is your age? I found myself having a very difficult time getting
interviews being an 18 year old (I was applying for above my age's average
skill level). I stopped mentioning my age as well as removed my birth year
from my online profiles. After that, interviews started coming in.

~~~
hwstar
Age isn't mentioned in my CV. Probably dates in the CV give age away.

~~~
seangrant
Oh yeah, didn't think about that aspect. Best of luck to you hwstar.

------
mchahn
I am a hardware engineer with a lot of software experience to go with it. I
have had no work since the "crash" in 2008 when I was 58. Since then no
company even returns a "no thanks" letter.

However I must admit there is a lot of karma involved. When I was 30, head of
engineering, I was responsible for hiring a total of 30 to 40 engineers. I
would have never hired anyone at my age. I didn't even think about it. It just
seemed obvious.

So I tell people I am retired, which means I'm old and unemployed. Like others
in these comments I am continuing to work, but only on FOSS projects, like the
Atom editor. I can now sling full-stack code with the best of them and I
figure I could for 10 or so years. But there is no hope of gainful employment.

~~~
hwstar
Your story almost matches mine. I didn't have the people skills to become a
manager though.

Because no one will hire older hardware engineers, we've been forced into
semi-retirement against our ultimate wishes. I like you spend a lot of time on
open source hardware and firmware projects and post them on github. It's the
only way to remain sane.

------
civilian
I'm 29, and I'm not a hiring manager, but here's where my ageism lies: People
in their 60s tend to be less open to new experiences.

My ~50 year old guitar teacher told me a story about how he refused to even
try guitar hero. I agree that, as an accomplished musicians, it would be kind
of insulting to be asked to play guitar hero by your student. But it's such a
good opportunity to learn where the student is coming from, and understand how
it could teach timing and patterns, even if it doesn't teach fingering or
picking.

My ~65 year old dad is still working as a consultant and actively gives paid
speeches, and he plays a lot of solitaire and minesweeper on the computer.
I've tried to get him to try a few videos game-- I even pitched Kerbal Space
Program, from the educational aspect of understand our own space program
better. (When I was in D.C. at the National Air and Space Museum, I was
recognizing parts that KSP had copied the models of.) He has no interest in
it.

My mom, and my aunts on both side of the family are extremely stubborn about
their political beliefs, and phrase their responses as: "oh, well, _I_ believe
that ____". Not trying to seek a consensus, not trying to crack an argument.
Just laying out their own belief. (Their political beliefs range from: common
Democrat, pro-choice conservative, global-focused liberal.)

I get the idea that, as we grow older, we've kind of discovered what we like
and what we don't like. I usually just have Cookies & Cream ice cream, because
it's my favorite. I don't try rocky road again because the nuts give it a bad
texture. But if a young person strongly recommended Rocky Road Version 5, I
hope I would try it for the sake of trying it.

So that's where my ageism comes from. I've told my younger brother to call me
out on not being open to new experiences, if that's something that happens to
me in my old age. At the very least, it'll be a good source of brotherly
humor.

~~~
TinyTimZamboni
I spent a summer regularly exercising with a group of friends who were all in
the 50-80 age range (and they kicked my butt). One day there was a
conversation like this:

"You know who I saw the other day? Nancy!"

"How's she doing?"

"Well, she's OLD"

"Yeah, that happens"

"How does that happen anyway? One day they're your friend, the next they're
old and only complain about their health"

"It's because they stop hanging out with young people".

------
WalterSear
Bloviating presentation of anecdata. This problem may be getting worse, or
better: there's no real evidence here, just scaremongery.

~~~
hwstar
There's lots of evidence, and older engineers are very vulnerable. If you are
an engineer over 55 who gets let go, you'd better have investments and rental
income, or you'll lose everything.

~~~
umeshunni
Can you share the evidence?

~~~
hwstar
[https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2014/04/28/what-
silicon...](https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2014/04/28/what-silicon-
valleys-ageism-means/)

[https://newrepublic.com/article/117088/silicons-valleys-
brut...](https://newrepublic.com/article/117088/silicons-valleys-brutal-
ageism)

[http://fortune.com/2014/06/19/tech-job-ads-
discrimination/](http://fortune.com/2014/06/19/tech-job-ads-discrimination/)

~~~
DenisM
That's some good stuff, thank you for sharing. I'm now inclined to agree that
ageism is very likely, and deserves a formal inquiry.

------
lutusp
The irony of editorials like this is that it will reduce the likelihood that
companies will hire older workers. Who wants an employee who is simultaneously
less productive and more narcissistic than a younger one?

Imagine the effect of government saying, "You have to keep any older workers
you hire." Think really hard. :)

By the way, lest someone get the wrong idea, I'm 70 years old.

------
aklemm
Moreso even than ageism, it's frustrating the way young and old struggle to
exchange ideas. The young, I think, are to blame for not being interested. But
the old need to come to terms with the possibility that the judgmental
attitude which comes easily after a lifetime of forceful experiences may just
be too off-putting for the young to put up with.

------
WalterBright
I plan on working until my mind doesn't work anymore. If nobody will pay me,
I'll just work on open source projects. I'm really not interested in retiring.

~~~
tetraodonpuffer
I think a lot of people here feel the same way, the problem is, if nobody will
pay you, how are you going to eat and have a place to work on open source
projects in?

~~~
hwstar
When you are young, you feel invincible.

You think: I can continue working till I die. This reasoning is flawed.

When you are young, a wise thing to do is to live below your means, save and
invest, and prepare for the day when your employer will kick you to the curb.

------
zanewill9
I see a strong conflation of "older" with "lots of personal responsibilities"
that affect job performance.

It's clearly true that 30 year olds are more likely to have kids then 20 year
olds, but it seems 40 and 50 year olds get "blamed" for being unproductive
because of things like kids, mortgages, etc, than do the 30 year olds.

The interesting study is the 45 year old with no kids, house or marriage. Are
they "old" too ?

------
dillon
I think this is a very opinionated and one-sided article. Prejudices exist
everywhere and ageism definitely exist. You're most likely to complain about a
particular prejudice when: it directly affects you, you think it directly
affects you, or it affects someone you know. As far as ageism I definitely
understand the point of view the author has. I think the other side of the
story here is in the workplace the "more experienced" engineers "may" dismiss
the ideas and contributions of a younger engineer even if they are completely
valid and logical. This is the kind of social prejudice I have witnessed in
the workplace. There are most certainly even more prejudices that exist in the
workplace regarding age. I think it's unfortunate that the author decided to
rant about an issue and not present all the facts as if a particular group of
people have it easier than a different group.

------
TinyTimZamboni
I think people were let go because they weren't good at their jobs, not
because they were old. People who have been fired because they weren't good
enough are going to have a harder time finding a new job.

Our education system is teaching more advanced topics at younger and younger
ages. Hence younger people may be more "up to date".

An older person will experience ageism, but they can combat this by always
learning new things throughout their life. I'll take a 50 year old javascript
developer who's proactive about testing and CI over a less experienced younger
developer.

But I'm going to choose an inexperienced javascript developer over an 50 year
old experienced COBOL deverloper if I'm building websites.

~~~
DiversityinSV
Thank you for the 'mansplaining' and for reinforcing stereotypes that older
people 'must not have been good at their jobs' and by showing your ageism
proudly. You are doing us all proud TinyTim. You go boy!

------
threatofrain
Aside from the fact that it's the young who are being wrecked in employment,
there are logical reasons why a company in some area of competition may choose
a younger person over an older person.

Obviously where experience matters more, companies might choose an older
person, such as in a high-level executive position, where I presume most
people are older.

But experience isn't everything, and _g_ tests have consistently beaten years
of relevant work experience as a single-metric predictor of work performance.
I don't doubt that you'd want your kernel security team to be veterans, but
other companies are justified in hiring young people out of college and having
them learn as they go.

------
hwstar
My prescription for a fix:

1\. Require age diversity in the workplace.

2\. Replace "at will" employment with "just cause" employment

3\. Get rid of noncompetes at the federal level.

4\. Replace binding arbitration with employment tribunals (as used in the UK).

~~~
kbob
What do you mean by #3?

~~~
hwstar
Allows people to move freely. This creates more demand in the labor market,
and therefore employers become more receptive to hiring older people.

------
DKnoll
>If the company is a small company and screens applications manually, it is
simple to Google a person and find their age as well as other private
information about them.

You only have yourself to blame for making those 'private' details publicly
accessible.

~~~
TrevorJ
So if minorities are discriminated against in the hiring process, they should
just stop posting their picture on LinkedIn? That's _not_ a solution.

Secondly, what you are suggesting is at complete odds with the realities of
our connected online world. You are basically asking someone to stop taking
part in a huge part of the social experience in our society.

~~~
DKnoll
I'd argue that what you call a "social experience" is really just giving your
information away for the sake of vanity, but to each his own.

Personally I don't use a profile picture on LinkedIn because my appearance is
irrelevant.

------
guhcampos
Unfortunatelly this is a simple matter of math. Hiring someone is costly, and
there has to be a return for the time and money invested. As you get older,
you get closer and closer to retiring, so the time you have to return the
investment made by the company in you is just not enough to justify such
investment.

There's no easy answer. There are too much advantages (as mentioned in the
comments: young people are more open to new ideas, easier to manipulate,
easier to manage, willing to be paid less, while the older people's only
advantage is experience, which may not really be an advantage if your
experience is too biased to a single market, company or position). The more
competition there is in the market for talents, the wider the gap is. That's
not a vice, or inherently evil, that's just a fact of life: as we get older,
we get less useful. We lose efficiency both physically and mentally - some
more than others, but that happens to everyone.

It's sad, revolting and definitely not fair, but I - personally - can't see a
way around this that makes rational, not emotional, sense.

~~~
DrScump
<As you get older, you get closer and closer to retiring, so the time you have
to return the investment made by the company in you is just not enough to
justify such investment.>

That argument makes sense... in 1980.

In the modern era of frequent job-hopping, who is more likely to jump ship the
next time a competitor dangles something shiny in front of her/him? The
25-year-old or the 50-year-old?

