We Should All Be Against Age Discrimination

I never really thought much about age discrimination when I was younger. To me, that was something that happened to old people and in my short time on earth, I really did not know too many of those. My grandparents were already retired and seemingly quite content, and it just did not seem like that big of a deal. It was not until my father got laid off in his early 50s that I begin to understand that we should all be against age discrimination.

My father had never really been one to stick with a job, and I had always worried that it would eventually catch up with him. He was working at a sheet metal manufacturing plant, and was absolutely miserable, so he decided to quit. The problem was, he was 51 at the time, and as his savings started to run out, he became pretty desperate.

I don't think he realized that a lot of companies are not as likely to hire someone who is closer to retirement age, because they don't want to pay more money to someone with more experience, and they want to have someone who will be there for a longer time. While most companies like to talk the talk and come out against age discrimination, it has been my experience that most companies to not actually put that into practice.

It was sad for me to watch my father put in application after application to no avail. On those rare occasions that he actually got an interview, he almost always came home disappointed. He would say that he thought it went pretty well, but we knew that was mainly for our benefit. It was at that time that I realized how important it is that we work to end age discrimination, because my father did nothing wrong but was being punished because of something over which he had no control.

It was quite a relief when my father finally found a job with the local police department. I would talk to him occasionally about the need to come out against age discrimination, and he would typically just smile and thank me for my concern. I realized that he was just happy to have a job that he actually liked and enjoyed working.

I don't know if there is much that we can do about age discrimination as a society, but I do believe that if people point out that it is wrong and not acceptable, it will help a lot. If history is any indicator, when people agree that something is wrong and needs to be changed, it eventually does change.