Age and Employment.

At Humba-HR-Consultants we tried to recap the concept of age and employment. The results we received were very interesting especially after talking to the senior citizens who are mostly criticised for inefficiency due to old age, likely to challenge subordination and naturally change resistant.

What is age discrimination?

Age discrimination happens when someone is unfairly disadvantaged for reasons, which cannot be objectively justified, relating to their age.  Employment discrimination happens when a job seeker or an employee is treated unfavourably because of his or her race, skin colour, national origin, gender, disability, religion, or age. Here's information on age discrimination and other employment discrimination issues.

It can:

• Affect anybody regardless of how old they are.
• Adversely affect employment opportunities, especially those of older people and younger people.
• Result in failure to consider skills-based abilities, potential and experience in the workplace.

Result in significant legal costs, compensation, and settlements paid to avoid defending expensive discrimination claims.

It's against the law for your employer to treat you worse than other colleagues at work because of your age, unless they've got a very good reason. It's also against the law for an employer to dismiss you or to refuse to employ you, just because of your age, unless they have got a very good reason. If your employer does this, it's called age discrimination. An employer is not allowed to discriminate against you either for being too young or for being too old.

It might also count as age discrimination if you are discriminated against because: of the age of someone you know, such as family or friends, rather than because of your own age. For example, your employers can't discriminate against you for being the carer of an elderly relative. This is known as discrimination by association your employer believes you to be a certain age, when you are not.

In addition, to being considered "old," experienced candidates are sometimes considered more of an expense (higher salary, pension, benefits costs, etc.) than a younger applicant would be.

If you are middle-aged, or even younger, keep in mind that you are not alone:

• Workers over 45 are unemployed longer than younger workers.
• Older workers are considering postponing retirement because of the down economy.
• Research has found no relationship between age and job performance.

It’s important that ageism, often called age discrimination, is addressed to ensure that nobody loses out because of their age.

Perhaps you have been in a situation where you have been discriminated against due to your age. You may be fully aware that you have been subject to ageism, but sometimes it’s not so obvious.

Although ageism is often seen as a workplace issue, you may face it when you’re out shopping, at the doctor’s surgery, or even when ordering products and services over the phone.

Some experiences that older people face are listed as follows-;

• Losing a job because of their age.
• Being refused interest-free credit, a new credit card, car insurance or travel insurance because of their age.
• Receiving a lower quality of service in a shop or restaurant because of the organisation’s attitude to older people.

• Not being eligible for benefits such as Disability Living Allowance due to age limits.
• Being refused a referral from a doctor to a consultant because you are ‘too old’.
• Being refused membership to a club or trade association because of your age.
• All of these situations are examples of ageism. You are protected against some of these situations by law, but not all of them.