Based on evidence, Philip Taylor’s blog article busts some well-worn myths about ageing and work. Population ageing has led to a lot of debate about prolonging working lives to reduce pension costs. There’s also much said about labour shortages as many current workers retire. But older people say they are discriminated against in the workplace. So, what is the reality?
International evidence challenges the current assumptions and misconceptions about older people and work. Age discrimination can happen at any age.
Taylor’s article goes right to the point in dispelling eight myths about discrimination only happening to older people. The research references are included in the article. Here are the myths in brief.
The myths
Myth 1: Age discrimination is only experienced by older people. Younger people also report discrimination based on age. Paradoxically, older people may also be perpetrators of age discrimination, including other older people.
Myth 2: Generations have different orientations to work. Employee life stage and competing home life responsibilities at any age are key – not generation. Claims that one generation has ‘better’ attributes than another are not helpful for workplace managers.
Myth 3: Older people are a homogenous group. Older and younger people have different aspects of their identity that impact their work experience of inclusion and exclusion. People are not one dimensional at any age. Should we, therefore, even talk about ‘older workers’ or just talk about workers or staff?
Myth 4: Older workers outperform younger ones in terms of reliability, loyalty, work ethic and life experience. Performance is unrelated to age. Addressing ageism with these stereotypes is no good for either older or younger people. Job performance varies more between people of the same age than between different ages.
Myth 5: Older people have a lifetime of experience that managers should recognise. It’s not experience itself that’s valuable, it’s relevant experience. It’s too easy to see older people as societal perceptions of ‘the past’ and not able to contribute to the future.
Myth 6: Younger workers are more dynamic, entrepreneurial, and tech-savvy than older workers. People should not be assumed to have (or not have) a given quality just because of their age. Workers of various ages may have similar skills, attributes and experiences.
Myth 7: Younger workers feel entitled and won’t stick around. In reality younger workers are more likely to be in insecure employment and to experience unemployment. Age has little to do with commitment to work. Youth unemployment rates are often higher than those of older people.
Myth 8: Older people who stay on at work are taking jobs from younger people. Evidence is that when employment rates increase for older people, they also increase for younger people. So age may have no effect. One is not substituting the other.
In summary
Ageism can happen at any age and using stereotypes is unhelpful at both ends of the age spectrum. Pitting generations against each other doesn’t engender an inclusive workplace approach for either management or staff. The focus on discrimination of older people in the workplace leaves younger people invisible in the discourse.
The title of this informative article is, Myth busting aging at work. You will re-think the way ageism is applied – it’s about all ages. After all, we are all in this together.