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History Of Age Discrimination
It is rather unfortunate that today, the term age discrimination is applicable to even a 40 year old. The so called phenomenon of age discrimination has resulted in lack of jobs, slow professional growth, unjustified layoffs and forced retirements for the older employees. |
The strategy of age discrimination implemented by most employers is rather understated, and at times gets complicated to prove in the open. Therefore, it is absolutely imperative for employees of 40 years or above to be well informed about the laws protecting their rights of employment.An employee in the 19th century worked to the best of his or her ability till one could sustain the level of professional productivity with respect to age. Thereafter, one would retire to a peaceful life after satisfactory work tenure. The advent of industrialization ushered in an era of pension reforms. Specifications of pension amounts and Social Security offered by the government lured older employees into timely retirement owing to the financial security steered by such schemes.
With the end of World War II, the scenario completed changed in the professional arena. Parallel to the conclusion of this war came in the epoch of baby boom. With the onset of this phase, the younger generation seemed to be saturating the work places leaving the older employees with little choice but to depart.
The lifespan of the baby boom stretched from 1945 to the early phase of 1960s. As a consequence, the years between 1970s and 1980s saw an immense increase in the availability of young human resource. The baby boom brought in contradictory view points. Some companies altered their policies and welcomed the younger generation of workers and modern technology with open arms. This new found attitude personified the ‘old’ as a professional burden and associated the older employees with lack of technical know-how, rigidity of thought, conservative style of working and lack of zeal. However, at the same time there were those who perceived the young as disadvantageous. They believed that the youth would not enhance their productivity owing to factors such as lack of maturity and professional experience, unwillingness to start from the lowest cadre, arrogance and resorting to short cuts for achieving fast success.
Yet again, there were those who had got stuck with umpteen number of older employees due to the previously implemented ‘lifetime employment’ policies. As a consequence, the companies suffered poor outputs as not only were the older employees incapable of keeping abreast with the latest technology but were also taxing financially on the companies due to their fat pay packages. Many of these aspects resulted in companies resorting to age discrimination.
However, with the enforcement of discriminatory laws from 1967 onwards, the judiciary has equipped all older employees to retaliate against age bias and not be easy victims of age discrimination.
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History Of Age Discrimination
