Of all the kinds of employment discrimination, hiring younger workers in preference to older ones earns the least public condemnation. That’s a growing problem, not just because equality is increasingly prominent on the political agenda but because ageism makes less and less economic sense as birth rates go down and nations age.
Since 1950, the median age of the population has increased by 47% in Europe and by 29% in North America.
Though it imposes a bigger burden on social security systems, the aging isn’t all bad – humankind is getting better at fighting diseases and making life easier, so people live, and are productive, longer than before. But the share of people over the age of 55 who are gainfully employed has been rising faster in some countries with aging populations and slower in others.
In Germany, where a number of big companies invest in keeping older workers employed and even in drafting retirees back into the workforce, and in Poland, with its acute labor shortage and relatively weak social security system, the share of older people in employment has risen fast in the last 15 years. But in the U.S. and Russia, which also have aging populations, that share has stagnated.
In both countries, recent research shows a high prevalence of age discrimination, though it’s technically illegal. In a recent paper, David Neumark from the University of California, Irvine, analyzed the practice of a large U.S. restaurant chain and found that older people are invited for interviews less frequently than younger ones and then hired less often.
Older people have a bad reputation as workers. They’re supposed to be slow and reluctant learners and decision-makers; they’re also thought to be less productive while commanding higher salaries.
It’s tougher to get employers to dump the age-related prejudices.
Evidence of an actual wage-productivity gap is scarce. Older workers aren’t less productive than younger ones. And even though some cognitive skills do decline with age, that loss is counterbalanced by a person’s ability to operate on the basis of greater experience.
It’s tougher to get employers to dump the age-related prejudices, however, than the race and gender ones. For one thing, “too old” is harder to define. For another, ageism is the basis for much of today’s social justice activism: Older people are seen as the champions of outdated paternalistic and bigoted notions.
The laws and legal practice in age-discrimination cases are often discouraging. In some countries, the burden of proof that a job was denied because of a candidate’s age rests on the candidate.
In Europe, the practice is varied and inconsistent. In one German case, a 50-year-old man applied for a job twice – as himself and as a fictional 32-year-old with the same qualifications. Only the 32-year-old was invited for an interview. Still, a court ruled there was no discrimination, arguing that the employer was entitled to make subjective decisions.
There’s evidence that stronger age-discrimination laws keep older workers employed longer and benefit claims lower. That means shifting the burden of proof toward the employers would make sense. But the stick is not necessarily the best instrument when it comes to bringing employment practices into harmony with the shifting demographics of the workforce.
In 2017, the German economist Regina Konle-Seidl looked at the effectiveness of policies aimed at the retention and reintegration of older workers into the labor force and concluded that a combination of job-search training and hiring subsidies could work well.
Figuring out ways to keep older workers engaged and help them overcome the prejudices that prevent them from getting hired is a task often neglected by policymakers. But they won’t be able to delay much longer: As the retirement age goes up everywhere, nations will be forced to deal with increasingly disgruntled elderly people, who also happen to be the most disciplined voters.
Leonid Bershidsky is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist.
