How to recover from job loss when you're over 50

By Neil Patrick

Almost everything the baby boomers learned about how to get a job when we were younger is now redundant.

There’s a secret army of people who have fallen off the radar for government help with unemployment. It’s the over 50’s. If you are a specialist skilled worker over 50, the support available is really scant.

For older workers who lose their jobs, the statistics are truly horrific. Though the unemployment rate for people over 55 is just 5.1%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, compared to the overall rate of 7.3%, when older workers lose their jobs they are out of work for a long time, according to the AARP Public Policy Institute.

In August 2013, 47% of job seekers over 55 had been looking for 27 weeks or more. According to the Institute, on average, unemployed people over 55 have been jobless for nearly a year: 50 weeks, versus 34 weeks for those under 55.

Until now, Western governments have never had to address the problem of highly educated professional people being unemployed. In the past it was always semi-skilled and unskilled workers who would find themselves without work, if an employer or industry sector went through hard times.

And so government support agencies were set up to provide help for workers of this type. They developed simple programmes to support people like this. Help with writing their resumes. Advice on how to seek out potential employers. Help with interview tips.

These sorts of programmes were reasonably effective too because unskilled and semi-skilled labour is highly transferable – for example if you are a truck driver, you can work for a mining company, or a grocery delivery business or a healthcare provider.

So the unemployed of previous recessions were manageable by and large.

Fast forward to today. The economic crisis hasn’t just affected semi-skilled and unskilled workers, it has hit hard into the skilled professional classes too. This is a whole different problem. And because compared to the young unemployed, the 'grey' unemployed are less numerous and less likely to cause trouble, they remain a low priority for government help.

Let’s say you used to be a mortgage credit risk analyst. You probably had more job opportunities between the late 1990’s and the 2008 crash than you’d ever have thought possible. Mortgage lending was through the roof as banks and borrowers got drunk on the crazy credit boom merry-go-round. And the job market reflected this situation.

Then we had the financial collapse of 2008. Almost overnight, the lending stopped. And even now, more than five years later, banks are still lending nowhere near the amounts they were before the crash. No-one wants to hire a credit risk analyst.

An old colleague of mine was a seriously clever mathematical guy, who had spent 20 years of his career becoming an expert in the development of credit risk scorecards. In 2008, he lost his job with many others in the lending industry. And he’s been unemployed ever since.

Government help is virtually non-existent for the highly skilled professional who’s become unemployed, especially if they are over 50.

But it doesn’t have to be like this. You’re smart and you have a good mind. So use it!

Yes the job that you used to have may be gone forever. Your industry may be in meltdown. You may feel that you’ll never get back the career you once had.

These things may all be true. But it’s not the end, if you take on board some simple alternative truths.

The first fact to take on board is that almost everything we learned about how to get a job when we were younger is now redundant. We have to completely recalibrate how we think about our jobs and our futures.

And you can do it. Here’s the good news:

1. Do not define yourself by what you used to do

Instead think of all the skills and competencies you acquired in your decades of work. Think broadly about these. You might for example be a really great at organisation, leading teams, researching, writing reports, complicated mathematical evaluations. Forget the application of these skills and isolate them as part of your personal asset value.

Being really clear about this personal asset value is the foundation of your next career step.

2. Create your strategy before you start the search

Do not rush into sending your resume off and asking people if they know about a job opening. Instead, in the weeks and first few months after losing your job, you should start the re-evaluation process. Think of it as an opportunity rather than a problem. You suddenly have the chance to become who you always wanted to be, instead of the person your old job defined you as.

By all means have discussions within your network about what they are doing, but remember you are looking for a problem you can help solve, not necessarily a job someone wants to fill.

3. Get focussed and forensic in your search

Don’t hunker down behind your computer. Do not spend hours hunting jobs boards for possible job vacancies. Do not mass mail or email your resume to every opening you think looks like a possibility. You only need one job. Instead of the splatter gun approach, sit down do your homework and focus on your targets like a sniper.

If you combine this forensic approach with extensive networking and intelligence gathering, you’ll uncover pathways into what is called the hidden jobs market. These are the jobs that are never advertised. And some estimates suggest that this is now as high as 80% of all skilled hirings.

4. Tap into the real intel

Get out and network with all your old contacts. Read the local business press to see what problems businesses are having that you might be able to help them solve. This is where you’ll discover real opportunities.

5. Get your networking amplifiers working for you

This where to invest your time online. Sharpen up your LinkedIn profile. Increase your connections – not because they will necessarily have a job for you, but because as LinkedIn sees you are more active on the site, it will improve your search ranking. So when a recruiter does a search for your skill set in your location, you’ll be higher on the returns and they’ll find you.

6. Use social media to help

As I’ve written about here, and in many other posts on this blog, there are a ton of ways you can use social media to help you with your job search. Again the secret is to be smart and to have a strategy.

Having a blog is really powerful too. And if you do this, you’ll destroy at a single stroke the idea that many employers have that older workers are just not up to speed with today’s technologies. See my post about this here


And finally remember this. The economy isn't going to improve dramatically anytime soon. There’s not going to be a sudden surge of new jobs coming over the horizon. The number of people going after each job is only going to increase. And we cannot rely on the government to help us.

The way you will win isn't by getting lucky. It’s because you will make sure you are a better hunter and a perceived as a better candidate than the competition. Fortunately that’s not too hard, if you hunt smarter not harder.

New Zealand: Ageism is alive and kicking

By Raewyn Court

Ageism on the job and not enough cash to retire ... it's tough being a working senior

If you're in your golden years and don't think you have enough money saved for a comfortable retirement, you're in good company.

A study by recruitment firm OCG Consulting says only 6 per cent of New Zealand workers aged over 50 have sufficient savings for "financial security" and a "good lifestyle" in retirement.

OCG's report, Coming of Age: the impact of an ageing workforce on New Zealand business, shows the desperate financial situation of many older workers, as well as widespread workplace age discrimination.

The survey of 864 job-seekers and 56 senior business people highlights that by 2031, one million people will be of retirement age, yet six out of 10 workers over 50 today say their retirement savings are insufficient.

OCG chief executive George Brooks says the combination of financial necessity and frequent ageism is leading the country towards a socio-economic crisis as a generation of baby boomers prepare to retire.

"This is a human issue, a business issue and an economic issue," he says.

"It's not enough to say the market will sort it out because our analysis shows the market isn't, and these grim statistics need to be addressed."

The report shows that during the past five years, about 60 per cent of job seekers have seen or experienced age discrimination, including reduced access to promotion, less interesting jobs, lower remuneration and reduced training opportunities.

Brooks says that while similar surveys have shown a degree of discrimination, reports from employers and employees show ageism is more prevalent than realised.

Although close to half of employers agree that older workers are a largely untapped resource, few have strategies for ageing workforce participation.

Brooks says there needs to be a wider appreciation of the value older workers bring to businesses, including knowledge, experience, productivity and ability to handle a crisis.

"Financial need, coupled with ageism, is a very real economic, political and social problem," he says.

"It is individual firms and the workers they employ who make the decision to hire or not to hire an older worker. Solving this problem requires leadership and cultural change."

One company that rejects age discrimination is international beverages company, Frucor New Zealand.

"The age of an applicant, like their gender, is irrelevant," says managing director Mark Callaghan.

"By way of example, we have recently built a new distribution centre and wanted to improve the level of shift leaders.

"We made three hires - a man in his late 30s, a woman in her early 30s and a man in his 50s. What they had in common is that they were the best individuals for the job."

Callaghan believes there are many positive factors in employing an older person, such as experience, maturity, life balance and stability, as well as stickability.

"More mature workers tend to want to build a career with the organisation they are in. That is something we encourage at Frucor."

Half the senior employers surveyed in the OCG report cited negative factors in hiring an older person, including cost, lack of adaptability, health issues, IT illiteracy and lack of ambition.

Callaghan says these factors would be a concern - or at least things to consider - when hiring anyone, irrespective of their age.

"Lack of adaptability is not something that is exclusive to older people. Again, what is most important is the individual and their attitude."

This post originally appeared here:

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11148248

RICHARD BRANSON: Hiring older workers is the right thing to do

Here's a interview with Richard Branson last year, in which he gives his views on the value of older workers. Given the association of the Virgin brand with youthful vigor, not to mention Branson's penchant for adrenaline stoked adventures, I think his views on this subject are worth repeating here. Apparently he plans to work until he is 90...

Q: What is your approach to hiring older workers? If you were looking for a position, how would you look to overcome the ageism barrier?

A: Thank you for your question! It is an appropriate time for me to address the issues of age and the workforce, as I turned 60 in July.

This year I ran my first marathon in just over five hours and tried to set a record as the oldest person to kite-surf across the English Channel (high winds forced me to abandon the attempt) - both tasks usually associated with younger people. And I'm not alone. These days, people are living much longer, active lives - so retiring at a young age is no longer necessary. If a person looks after himself with regular exercise and a good diet, there is no reason why he should not keep going well past 60.

I plan to work until I feel I'm no longer making a real contribution to Virgin. I see a good 30 years of work ahead. It's true that at 60 there are some tasks that suit me better than others, but I see few real limitations in my current role.

Richard Branson

In the UK, the government has recommended extending the age of retirement to 67, and many countries in the rest of Europe are contemplating similar legislation. It is not just governments, but company boards around the world that are facing the challenges of serving ageing populations.

So while it is true that some employers may have negative preconceptions about hiring older workers, they are only doing themselves a disservice. Entrepreneurs and managers who hope to succeed are taking a close look at older applicants.

There are real advantages to hiring these employees. Studies have shown that older workers may lower time-keeping and absentee issues ; they also tend to have higher levels of commitment to their jobs and loyalty to their employers, which reduces staff churn and helps reduce recruitment costs.

And there is a strong business case for companies to diversify the age groups they employ. In all our ventures, we put a real emphasis on offering great service, and to succeed, we must truly understand our customers and see our service through their eyes. As our and others' customer bases get older, managers will need staffers who themselves reflect the changing demographics.

This is a challenge for Virgin since we have tended to be quite young at heart. The average age in the group is still fairly young, with more than a third of staff under the age of 35 and only around 3% over 55.

This is largely determined by a few factors, including the sectors we operate in and the newcomer status of some of the businesses. For example, Virgin Active, our health club chain, attracts a younger workforce due to the physical nature of the work. As the challengers to established brands, our airlines - Virgin America, Atlantic and Blue - have tended to be magnets for younger cabin crews and ground staff, which affects the group's average age.

Even our finance business has younger staff - again, people interested in the company's challenger status and in new product development. But as we prepare for the future, this is a factor that clearly needs to change.

How? Well, many businesses retire their experienced staffers, both to cut costs when times get tough and as a matter of course. But those employers can lose a lot of key skills when workers with a wealth of knowledge and experience leave.

One answer is to become more accommodating in work arrangements. Offering part- time jobs, job shares, flexi-time and full-time jobs with longer holidays may attract older workers. This would enable everyone - not just older employees - to strike a better work-life balance and allow companies to retain their skills and experience.

I hope that with this approach, our group will continue to maintain a very open policy of recruitment and that ageism will not be an issue. Hiring older workers isn't just the right thing to do; it also makes good business sense.

Branson blogs on www.virgin.com/richard- branson/blog. You can follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ richardbranson.

This post originally appeared here:
http://www.bdlive.co.za/articles/2010/10/14/richard-branson-value-the-skills-of-older-workers;jsessionid=27C5CBE518983FFEF9FD83338E88121E.present1.bdfm

Baby boomers fueling wave of entrepreneurship

By Matt Sedensky

In a mix of boomer individualism and economic necessity, older Americans have fueled a wave of entrepreneurship. The result is a slew of enterprises such as Crash Boom Bam, the vintage drum company that 64-year-old Glay began running from a spare bedroom in his apartment in 2009.

The business hasn’t made him rich, but Glay credits it with keeping him afloat when no one would hire him.

"You would send out a stack of 50 resumes and not hear anything," said Glay, who had been laid off from a sales job. "This has saved me."

The annual entrepreneurial activity report published in April by the Kansas City, Mo.-based Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation found the share of new entrepreneurs ages 55 to 64 grew from 14.3 percent in 1996 to 23.4 percent last year. Entrepreneurship among 45- to 54-year-olds saw a slight bump, while activity among younger age groups fell.

The foundation doesn’t track start-ups by those 65 and older, but Bureau of Labor Statistics data show that group has a higher rate of self-employment than any other age group.

Part of the growth is the result of the overall aging of America. But experts say older people are flocking to self-employment both because of a frustrating job market and the growing ease and falling cost of starting a business.

"It’s become easier technologically and geographically to do this at older ages," said Dane Stangler, the research and policy director at Kauffman. "We’ll see continued higher rates of entrepreneurship because of these demographic trends."

Paul Giannone’s later-life move to start a business was fuelled not by losing a job, but by a desire for change.

After nearly 35 years in information technology, he embraced his love of pizza and opened a Brooklyn, N.Y., restaurant, Paulie Gee’s, in 2010. Giannone, 60, had to take a second mortgage on his home, but he said the risk was worth it: The restaurant is thriving and a second location is in the works.

"I wanted to do something that I could be proud of," he said. "I am the only one who makes decisions and I love that. I haven’t worked in 3 ½ years, that’s how it feels."

Some opt for a more gradual transition.

Al Wilson, 58, of Manassas, Va., has kept his day job as a program analyst at the National Science Foundation while he tries to attract business for Rowdock, the snug calf protector he created to ward off injuries rowers call "track bites."

Though orders come in weekly from around the world, they’re not enough yet for Wilson to quit his job.

"At this stage in my life, when I’m looking at in the near future retiring, to step out and take a risk and start a business, there was some apprehension," Wilson said. "But it’s kind of rejuvenated me."

Mary Furlong, who teaches entrepreneurship at Santa Clara University and holds business startup seminars for boomers, says older adults are uniquely positioned for the move because they are often natural risk-takers who are passionate about challenges and driven by creativity.

There can be hurdles.

Though most older entrepreneurs opt to create at-home businesses where they are the only employee, even startup costs of a couple thousand dollars can be prohibitive for some. Also, generating business in an online economy is tougher if the person has fewer technological skills.

Furlong said many who start businesses later in life do so as a follow-up to a successful career from which they fear a layoff or have endured one.

"The boomers are looking to entrepreneurship as a Plan B," she said."

Antoinette Little would agree.

She spent 20 years at a law firm, starting as a legal secretary and working her way up to manage the entire office. The stress of working 80 hours or 90 hours a week and always being on call started taking a toll.

After being diagnosed with an enlarged heart, she said, "The doctor told me either quit or you’re going to die."

Little took a series of culinary classes and found a new passion, opening Antoinette Chocolatier in Phillipsburg, N.J. She misses her previous career and, though the store is now in the black, the profits aren’t robust. Still, she says she is having fun making chocolate, particularly when children press their noses against the glass doors to the store’s kitchen.

"I’m my own boss and you get to eat your mistakes," she said. "How bad could it be?"

Most boomer businesses are not brick-and-mortar establishments like those of Little and Giannone.

Jeff Williams, who runs BizStarters, which has helped Glay and thousands of other boomers start businesses, says most older entrepreneurs want to make a minimal investment, typically less than $10,000, to get off the ground.

He classifies about 40 percent of his clientele as "reluctant entrepreneurs" who are turning to their own business because they can’t find any other work.

Williams said owning a business also gives older adults the flexibility they desire and a sense of control while remaining active.

"To suddenly leave the corporate world and to be sitting around the house all day long? This is an alien concept to boomers," he said.

Glay says he needed the paycheck, but starting his business was also about keeping his mind engaged. He had worked for the same record company for 23 years when he was told to meet his boss at an airport hotel, where the bad news was delivered.

Though Crash Boom Bam hasn’t come close to replacing an annual income that crept into six figures, Glay says he’s busier than ever now, between the business, regular drumming gigs, and part-time work at a bookstore and a wine-tasting event company. Sitting among shelves full of drums and their shimmering chrome, he is reflective thinking about what his business means.

"The satisfaction of doing what I’m doing now is much greater, but the money is less," he said. "Even if it’s not making me a millionaire, I know what it’s doing for my head. There’s no price you could put on that."

Matt Sedensky, an AP writer on leave, is studying aging and workforce issues as part of a one-year fellowship at the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, which joins NORC’s independent research and AP journalism. The fellowship is funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and supported by APME, an association of AP member newspapers and broadcast stations.

This post originally appeared here:

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/money/57010864-79/business-older-glay-job.html.csp?page=2

The spurious historical origins of how we think about retirement

By Neil Patrick

My father retired 25 years ago. He wasn’t an especially high earner. He taught at a University, but he was offered a big financial incentive to retire early. He took the money and settled into a life of golf, gardening, tennis and socialising. A quarter of a century more or less doing what he felt like and more or less worry-free.

That sort of outcome seems a remote possibility for most of my generation.

An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll released this week found unsurprisingly that the majority of older workers are delaying their retirement plans. They also report that reaching 65 won’t necessarily mean they exit from the workforce.

Some 82% of workers aged 50 and older say it is likely they will work for pay in retirement. And 47% of them now expect to retire later than they previously thought - on average nearly three years beyond their estimate when they were 40.

At first I envied my father. All that time. Endless days to spend doing whatever he wanted. But then I thought again. As he became more and more removed from the world of work, I saw how he also became more and more disconnected from how the world was evolving. The biggest change that passed him by was the endless rise of technology and digital media.

He knows how to browse the web with his iPad, but he still cannot send an email. He finds it extremely difficult to interact with web pages to do even simple things like getting his groceries delivered.

And keeping in touch with friends and family is becoming harder too since he refuses to dial a mobile phone number because he’s paranoid about the risk of being charged more for the call than he would be on a landline.

The world is slowly but steadily becoming a more and more alien place for him. And so I’m not so sure anymore that my father’s experience was such a dream ticket after all.

In the beginning, there was no retirement. Because there were no old people. In the Stone Age, everyone was fully employed until age 20, by which time nearly everyone was dead, usually of unnatural causes. An early man who lived long enough to turn grey was either worshiped or eaten as a sign of respect.

By Biblical times, when a fair number of people made it into old age, retirement still had not been invented and respect for old people remained high. In those days, it was customary to carry on until you dropped, regardless of your age group. When a patriarch could no longer farm, herd cattle or pitch a tent, he opted for more specialized, less labor-intensive work, like prophesying and handing down commandments. Or he moved in with his kids.

As the centuries passed, the elderly population increased. By early medieval times, their numbers had reached critical mass. It was no longer just a matter of respecting the occasional white-bearded patriarch. Old people were everywhere, giving advice, repeating themselves, complaining about rheumatism, trying to help, getting in the way and making younger people feel guilty.

To the annoyance of their offspring, they also tended to hang on to their wealth and property. This made them very unpopular with their middle-aged sons, who were driven to earn their inheritances the old-fashioned way, by committing patricide. Even as late as the mid-18th century, there was a spate of such killings in France.

Clearly aging and what to do about it was a becoming a problem.

Otto Von Bismarck

In 1883, Chancellor Otto Von Bismarck of Germany inadvertently created a solution. Marxists were threatening to take control of Europe. To help his countrymen resist this threat, Bismarck announced that he would pay a pension to any nonworking German over age 65. Bismarck was no dummy. Hardly anyone lived to be 65 at the time, given that penicillin would not be available for another half century. Bismarck not only co-opted the Marxists, he set the arbitrary world standard for the exact year at which old age begins and established the precedent that government should pay people for growing old.

It was the physician William Osler who put forward the ‘scientific’ argument that, when combined with a compelling economic rationale, would eventually make retirement seem to be acceptable. In his 1905 valedictory address at the Johns Hopkins Hospital, Osler said it was a matter of ‘fact’ that the years between 25 and 40 in a worker's career are the ''15 golden years of plenty.'' He called that span ''the anabolic or constructive period.'' Workers between ages 40 and 60 were merely uncreative and therefore tolerable. He hated to say it, because he was getting on, but after age 60 the average worker was in his view ''useless'' and should be put out to pasture.

Retirement came in very handy in the United States, where large numbers of aging factory workers were wandering around the Industrial Revolution, slowing down assembly lines, taking too many personal days and usurping the places of younger, more productive men with families to support. It was one thing when an occasional superannuated farmer leaned on his hoe in an agrarian culture -- a few bales of hay more or less didn't matter. But it was quite another when lots of old people caused great unemployment among younger workers by refusing to retire.

The Great Depression made the situation even worse. Retirement was a necessary adaptation and everybody knew it, but the old guys were not going quietly. The toughest among them refused to quit, even when plant managers turned up the conveyor belts to Chaplinesque speeds.

Francis Townsend (right)

By 1935, it became evident that the only way to get old people to stop working for pay was to pay them enough to stop working. A Californian, Francis Townsend, initiated a popular movement by proposing mandatory retirement at age 60. In exchange, the Government would pay pensions of up to $200 a month, an amount equivalent at the time to a full salary for a middle-income worker. Horrified at the prospect of Townsend's radical generosity, President Franklin D. Roosevelt proposed the Social Security Act of 1935, which made workers pay for their own old-age insurance.

So these ideas about how and when we participate in work have clear historical origins. But are these rationales still valid today, when life expectancy and health care continues to advance and the world has a whole new set of economic and social challenges at both the macro and micro levels?

Should we accept the norms that have become accepted even though they came about more or less by chance and expediency and are founded on pseudoscientific arguments from the 19th and early 20th centuries?

Personally, I am choosing to adjust my life plan to one that isn’t headed towards a shutdown when I reach 65. Assuming my health permits, I intend to work for the whole of my life.

Even if that doesn’t suit the government.



Some parts of this post have been adapted from an original article by Mary-Lou Weisman form the New York Times March 21, 1999:
http://www.nytimes.com/1999/03/21/jobs/the-history-of-retirement-from-early-man-to-aarp.html

Why it's a LIE that olders workers are taking jobs from the young (pt2)

By Neil Patrick

This morning I was disappointed to read the article below from the Denver Post which promotes the notion that work opportunities for the young are being ‘stolen’ by older workers in Colorado.

Titled misleadingly, ‘Youths hit hard as older workers claim most new jobs’, the Denver Post article claims to show that mature workers are ‘stealing’ the job opportunities from the young. It even includes an apparently persuasive graph to 'prove' the point.

Of course this is all nonsense and I've provided the full transcript below for you to judge for yourself.

Granted, it’s a pleasingly convenient idea to grab when you look at the graph below, but as with so many news stories, it doesn’t actually tell the whole truth.

In fact it even contradicts the some of the key findings of the Report it cites, the Express Employment Professionals' white paper. This paper stated that, ‘The first Boomers turned 60 in 2006, so no one is surprised that they’re retiring. The size of this generation, which comprises 26.4 percent of the population and makes up the largest percentage of the workforce in the U.S. at 38 percent, is producing an increase in the retirement rate, impacting the labor force simultaneously”.

So it is clear that because of the large size of the baby boomer group, retirements in the US are actually increasing. If this is true, how can they also be taking jobs from the young? How can we reconcile these apparent contradictions?

Actually when we dig a little deeper, it’s not too hard to find the truth:

1. The fall in the level of workforce participation by the young can be directly attributed to increased numbers staying in education, the increase in those that have given up looking for work and the fact that many are choosing to stay at home, eased by ‘subsidies’ by their parents and others. To quote the Express Employment Report directly, “There are an estimated 1.8 million young adults who are not in the labor force because they have given up on job hunting for the time being”.
2. The article identifies two ‘outcomes’ i.e. the stable rate of labor force participation by older workers and the falling rate of employment amongst the young and assumes that the former is causing the latter. This isn't a causal relationship - one has not caused the other, so it is inaccurate to state that ‘older workers are claiming most new jobs’. 
3. The data is based on LFPR (Labor Force Participation Rate). This has absolutely nothing to do with job hirings. It is simply a measure of the proportion of people within a given group that are in paid employment. The LFPR for a group can rise or fall without anyone changing their job, simply by the number of people in that group changing for any reason e.g. retirement or emigration. 
4. Similarly, the growth in employment numbers for any given group doesn't equate to new jobs being filled; it has as much or more to do with the numbers that actually do not leave employment as it does with those that gain it. So for example if the numbers in employment increase in any given period, this number is the result of the net outcome of people joining and leaving the workforce. It does not equate to new jobs being filled.

So what is actually happening is that mature workers’ labor force participation is being stabilized by a balancing between a shrinkage of the group due to increasing numbers of retirees and others working longer and delaying retirement. Meanwhile, the LFPR by the young is falling due to low growth in the parts of economy generating jobs for which the young are qualified and a growth in those who are either staying in education or have given up looking for work.

Hardly the same story as the headline is it? And it’s the sort of sensationalist argument promoting inter-generational resentment that we don't need. Neither does it highlight the real issues which are nothing to do with age and everything to do with restoring real growth to the US economy.

Anyway, here’s the full story as it appeared in the Denver Post last weekend.

Youths hit hard as older workers claim most new jobs

By Aldo Svaldi The Denver Post


Welcome to the brave new labor force, where the young struggle to find a job, the old delay retirement and a shrinking share of the population is working.

"We have an actively disengaged portion of the population, and the implications are far reaching," said David Lewis, an executive with Express Employment Professionals, which put out a white paper on the topic last week.

Back in 2000, nearly half of 16- to 19-year-olds were employed in Colorado, and eight in 10 of those age 20 to 24 worked. But in 2012, fewer than three in 10 teenagers were employed and only 64.2 percent of those in their early 20s, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

At the other end of the demographic curve, employment among 55- to 64-year-olds in the state went from 60.8 percent employment to 64.8 percent over the same period. Among those 65 and older, it went from about 12 percent to 18.8 percent in 2012.

Since employment levels bottomed out in December 2009, workers age 55 and older have claimed nearly three out of four new jobs created in the U.S., according to the Center for Economic and Policy Research.

They were claiming about 84 percent of the jobs created in the 12 months through April, the center reports.

A look at unemployment rates disproves the myth that older workers were hit hardest by the recession, said Alexandra Hall, the state's chief labor economist.

Those age 55 to 64 in Colorado had a 6.8 percent unemployment rate last year. The unemployment rate among teenagers was at 26.2 percent.

The greater participation of older workers, including those past traditional retirement age, bucks the overall trend of fewer people working or looking for work with each passing year.

"Overall labor force participation rates will continue to decline as they have since 2000, through 2040," forecasts Cindy DeGroen, the state's director of population and economic forecasting.

People on either end of the age curve have more options when it comes to not working, which is why those groups are seeing some of the biggest shifts, Hall said.

One key explanation for fewer young adults working is that more of them are going to college, which is a positive for the economy, she said.

But even those with four-year college degrees are increasingly finding themselves underemployed, said futurist Tom Frey, executive director of the DaVinci Institute in Louisville.

About half of college graduates last year are holding jobs that don't require a degree, and about 35 percent are trying to start their own businesses, he said.

Some of the decline in youth employment is tied to a lack of opportunities, as older workers take jobs that traditionally would have gone to younger workers.

Some of it is also generational. Millennials, those age 18 to 30, are more optimistic than their elders about their employability, despite the difficult economy.

About 62 percent are confident of the possibility of a career, making them much less willing to settle for a "job," according to survey released Thursday by employment search provider Monster Worldwide.

"They believe they are worth more than the market does, especially if they graduate with a liberal-arts degree," Lewis said.

Lewis said that a third of millennials were raised by single parents, and many have tight familial bonds, making them less willing to move for an opportunity and more comfortable living at home.

Hall said the labor statistics show young adults, despite getting a later start, increasingly join the ranks of the employed by age 25 and beyond. The employment rate in Colorado among those age 25 to 34 is 78.3 percent.

But delayed entry into the workforce carries a cost, especially when it comes to developing what labor experts refer to as the soft skills, things like dependability, problem solving, professionalism and the ability to communicate with co-workers.

"They are getting older, but they are not very skilled because they haven't had a chance to work," Frey said.

At the other extreme are baby boomers, those born between 1946 and 1964, who find themselves, either by choice or necessity, working far longer than previous generations.

"You need more money to support a longer life span," DeGroen said of the group that has been called the healthiest and wealthiest generation.

Two severe bear markets in equities and one in real estate, not to mention low interest rates, have prevented many baby boomers from building the nest eggs they needed to retire.

Retirees over age 65 in Colorado are replacing, on average, about 56.5 percent of their pre-retirement income instead of the 70 percent that financial advisers recommend, according to astudy from Interest.com.

And a growing number of seniors in the country, about 338,000 of those over age 60, have financial responsibility for their grandchildren, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Still, even at 20 percent, the share of those 65 and older employed is only a fourth of the level seen among "prime age" workers, those from age 25 to 54.

Given that they can't work forever, one unknown is whether the accelerating departure of the baby boomers from the workforce will create opportunities for young adults.

"As employers have more demand for labor and bid up what they are willing to pay, workers will come into the workforce," Hall said.

Economist Lawrence Mishel, at the Economic Policy Institute, argues that the federal government should create a temporary five-year program to allow retirement at age 60 and above.

"Get them out of the way and let younger people have jobs," he said.

Colorado, which has one of the highest concentrations of baby boomers of any state, will see the number of residents over age 65 triple between 2000 and 2030, according to the state demographer's office.

But there are those who argue that demographics aren't the key factor. Labor markets are undergoing a fundamental shift that is changing the very definition of work and a job.

"We are becoming much more a free-agent and freelance society," said Frey.

The overhead costs for a full-time employee now average $10,000 a person, and employers remain reluctant to add to their workforce, he said.

Young adults simply have no choice but to become more entrepreneurial and flexible in how they make their living, he said.



http://www.denverpost.com/business/ci_23986720/youths-hit-hard-older-workers-claim-most-new

Tips for boomers to find ‘flexible’ jobs

By Andrea Coombes

A growing percentage of Americans say their retirement will entail some paid work, either because they’re worried about their lack of savings or because they want to stay active. But that doesn’t mean retirees are yearning for a 50- or 60-hour workweek.

Sixty-nine percent of workers said they plan to work for pay after they retire, according to the 2013 Retirement Confidence Survey by the Employee Benefit Research Institute.

And more workers said they plan to delay retirement: 36% of workers said they’ll wait until they’re 66 or older to retire (fully 26% said they’d wait until age 70 or older), up from 11% who said that in 1991. Read the study here.

Another 7% of workers said they don’t plan to retire at all.

If you’re among those who plan to continue working but you don’t want to keep going full-tilt, what’s the best way to find a good part-time or work-at-home gig?

The good news is that, anecdotally at least, there are employers out there looking to fill part-time jobs with experienced workers, and a number of websites aim to help people like you find those jobs.

And “part time” doesn’t have to mean a job at a fast-food restaurant or in retail.

“Some of the jobs employers are trying to fill are not what anyone would think of as an average telecommuting job,” said Sara Sutton Fell, founder and chief executive of FlexJobs, based in Boulder, Colo.

“These are high-level roles. They are very well suited to an older demographic who values flexibility and has the skills to bring to the table,” she said.

Some of the current openings on her site include “infrastructure management senior analyst,” firewall engineer, human-resources generalist and senior tax associate, Fell said. Some of the companies posting positions to the site include PwC (formerly PricewaterhouseCoopers), ADP and Xerox.

Tips for finding a job

Visit the job sites. You can search for part-time jobs onRetirementJobs.com, RetiredBrains.com, and Indeed.com, among others.

Meanwhile, FlexJobs only posts jobs that are part-time or flexible as well as professional (meaning they have opportunity for growth). The company vets each posting to make sure it’s legitimate (FlexJobs.com charges job seekers from $14.95 a month to $49.95 a year to see the listings).

Drop by. “If it’s an employer you know you want to work for, particularly if it’s a retail-based job, go in, meet with the manager,” said Kerry Hannon, a Washington-based career expert and author of “Great Jobs for Everyone 50+.” “Dress appropriately, drop off your resume and just say you’re available. Nothing beats a face-to-face meeting with somebody.”

Don’t rule out full-time job postings. For the right candidate, employers may consider alternative work arrangements. “Often, job-sharing arrangements and so forth come up,” said Tim Driver, chief executive of RetirementJobs.com and MatureCaregivers.com, in Boston. “It’s always worth exploring listings that are written as full time.”

Tap your network. Ask people you know whether they know of any part-time or telecommuting opportunities at their workplace—and whether they can put in a good word for you, Hannon said. “Employers love to hire people who they know or the people that work for them know,” she said.

Go beyond the big job websites. Interested in a nonprofit job, for example? “The Chronicle of Philanthropy has a great jobs board—that’s a good place to look for any kind of nonprofit job,” Hannon said, adding that “the nonprofits love part-time workers,” in part because those organizations often face budgetary constraints.

Ask your network about job boards, staffing companies and temp agencies that focus on your city or state. For example, a staffing agency called 10 til 2 focuses on part-time jobs in Colorado.

Hannon pointed to Flex Professionals, which lists jobs with flexible schedules in the Washington, D.C., area, and Special Counsel, which looks to place people in the legal profession.

Check with trade groups and your alumni association to see whether they know of or list flexible jobs. Also, college career centers often offer advice on career transitions, Hannon said. “A lot of them have great career coaches on staff who can help you with interviews and resumes.”

Visit universities’ online job boards. “Most of the big universities have job boards that you can check for part-time or full-time work,” Hannon said.

Avoid the scams

It’s no secret that many workers dream of working at home, and the idea is gaining acceptance among some employers, depending on the job type.

Still, “there’s been slower acceptance of that than even part-time work,” said Jill Ater, founder and chief operating officer of 10 til 2, the Denver-based staffing agency.

“Employers still want to see people, but sometimes you can start off in the office and transition once they learn to trust you,” Ater said. Job seekers might ask in the interview whether working at home is an option at some point. “See how the employer feels about it,” she said.

Unfortunately, the work-at-home dream is a target for scammers looking to separate you from your money, often by collecting fees upfront for equipment or information they say is necessary for their work-at-home “opportunity.”

As part of its premium service ($4.95 a month; you can cancel at any time), RetirementJobs.com offers a “Work at Home Guide” that lists organizations it considers legitimate, plus tips to stay safe.

Here are some other ways to steer clear of scams:

• Avoid ads that read like marketing copy. When looking for work, focus on ads that list a job title. “You want it to be a professional job posting and not marketing copy,” Fell said. “If it looks like they’re trying to get anybody to apply, that’s probably not a professional job posting.”

• Be wary of requests for money. Fell said the scam often goes like this: “We’re going to give you your own computer. We’ll mail that to you, but we do need to install some proprietary software on there, so you need to pay $400 for that.”

• Search for the company’s name on Google to make sure the website address given to you is legitimate. Sometimes scammers create fake websites that mimic real sites, to lure you to provide personal information or to send money. “They’ll mimic the names of the CEO, the director of HR, so the website really looks legit,” Fell said. “Unfortunately, they’re really good at it sometimes.”

• Search the company’s name with the word “scam” or “complaint” to see what others are saying.

• Be wary about sending personal information if the email address doesn't include the company name. “Make sure the job ad has the company domain name in it, rather than a general @hotmail or @gmail,” Fell said.

More resources

Here are some additional resources for finding part-time or flexible jobs:

Common Good Careers recruits for the nonprofit sector. Read more: Boomers: Get job recruiters on your side.

Idealist and Bridgespan also list jobs at nonprofit organizations.

Check out AARP’s page on working after retirement.

Encore.org offers a guide to finding work after 50.

Read more: Taxes, Social Security and your part-time job.

Andrea Coombes is a personal-finance writer and editor in San Francisco. She's on Twitter @andreacoombes.

This post originally appeared here:

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/tips-for-boomers-to-find-flexible-jobs-2013-08-29

Teenage Kicks - 5 career secrets our kids don’t want us to know

By Anna Pitts

As a mature person, there's a lot you can teach the next generations of job hunters, budding entrepreneurs and go-getters from your time in your profession. The successes you've created, the mistakes you've learned from and the opportunities you have had will no doubt equip you with valuable words of wisdom for anyone looking to learn from your unique experience.

However, this is not to say that you have nothing to gain from listening to a younger, fledgling career maker. ‘Young’ people can have the upper hand in one, important sector of knowledge, and one that is rapidly shaping the modern world: social media.

Of course you can use the internet; you’re always on your email, you have a Facebook account and send the odd tweet, but ‘young’ people are the ones who are dominating this new technology and therefore the ones who are shaping how these vital communication tools develop. And they are developing and changing fast.

Social media is one of the biggest tools at your disposal in terms of career development. Here are five career enhancing tips on social media from Anna Pitts at the Graduate Recruitment Bureau

1. Take the ‘work’ out of networking

LinkedIn is the fast track to the people you need to be connected to. You can easily find and engage with people that you might never meet in your ‘real-world’ activities, therefore broadening your horizons and expanding your opportunities.

Statistics on visual.ly show that 61% of professionals use LinkedIn as their primary networking site and over 50% of users have a graduate degree. The internet erases the boundaries of ‘possible’ networking, opening up an almost infinite number of valuable contacts to you.

Conferences will always be a fantastic way to network, however they sometimes leave out junior professionals who aren’t yet ‘important’ enough to be invited to big networking events. Young professionals often overcome this handicap by using their social media connections to compensate for their restricted access to this networking channel.

Having grown up with text messaging and social media, they are expert at connecting and nurturing relationships through digital media. It could also be argued that they are often better at this than real life interactions!

Almost subconsciously, they have learned that valuable relationships begin with gentle, almost casual interactions. Over time they cultivate these to become as valuable as or even more valuable than a ‘real world’ relationship might be.

The Baby boomer generation have spent their lives in a different world. One where a desire and respect for privacy and some ‘old-fashioned’ etiquette still survives. And they often apply these attitudes to how they use social media.

The inevitable result of this is that their LinkedIn network is often restricted to being a subset of their real world connections and no more. They miss out entirely on a potential global network of contacts that hold the potential to be of immeasurable value.

2. Learn the new rules of online networking

Just blundering up to someone on LinkedIn and asking to connect with them is likely to result in a rejection. So totally unsolicited invitations may result in rejections, but if you add a polite and flattering message as to why you are inviting them to connect, the chances are they will accept.

Better still, your chances of having an LinkedIn invitation accepted will be almost 100% if you’ve first paved the way by means of a lower impact connection through other platforms like Twitter, Facebook or a LinkedIn Group discussion.

Additionally, messaging on LinkedIn can get faster results than emailing a work address, as it has a personal touch - don’t be afraid to take the direct approach. It may be the enthusiasm of new professionals that lets them make such bold networking moves, but using social media in these proactive ways will exponentially boost the size, quality and value of your network.


3. Job hunt sophisticatedly

You might be ready to take the next step in your career, meaning you’ll be looking for new, better job opportunities. By all means, ask around your colleagues and look on job sites, but the first port of call for your younger counterparts would instantly be social media sites. Recruiters use LinkedIn to look for candidates and publicise their roles.

Use the search box and edit your preferences so that relevant information will be filtered onto your feed. Make sure your profile is attractive and eye catching to recruiters and companies; update your experience and bio, making sure your achievements are highlighted.

Using the advanced search on Twitter can expose you to many opportunities. Companies will often hashtag their roles, so searching for specific terms on the advanced search will bring the information to you in the click of a button.

A recent phenomenon among job seekers is the ‘Twitter CV’; used by young job hunters and graduates as a quick way to get their information to employers who are recruiting. A template of such a tweet looks like:

[name][current position][seeks new position][link to online profile/cv/work][relevant hashtags]

For example:

annaepitts. Sussex uni English Lang student. Seeks marketing role. http://www.linkedin.com/vsearch/p?orig=SEO_SN&firstName=Anna&lastName=Pitts&trk=SEO_SN #CV #marketingjobs

Alter the information and use targeted hashtags to personalise your tweet and make sure it reaches the right people.

4. Tweet all about it.

Twitter is fast becoming the most influential social media site there is; according to visual.ly over 100,000 tweets are sent every minute so its contribution to the business world is massive- think how many of those tweets will be from major companies! Having initially been developed as a way to spread news fast, it has taken off (no bird pun intended) and is now used in a plethora of ways, limited only by your creativity. The simple fact is that Twitter doesn’t come with a set of user instructions!

As well as being a new job hunting method, Twitter retains its primary function of rapid communication in the corporate setting. This is the aspect that you, the professional, can access and utilise. Connect with companies and recruiters or colleagues that would be beneficial to your career.

It’s all very well having lots of followers, but to get noticed you need to be engaging- creating and sharing content that your followers will be interested in. Join in discussions, retweet points of interest or send direct messages to companies you want to work with. Including targeted hashtags in your tweets will mean they join relevant trends and your tweet, and hence name, will be seen by anybody searching for that term.

Putting ‘RT’ (retweet) at the end of tweets you particularly want shared and seen can boost the chance of it being retweeted, meaning the chance you get noticed increases too. According to sysomos.com 92% of retweets happen in the first hour, and 29% of tweets get a reaction. Say something worth sharing to make sure you are in that 29%.

5. Have dual accounts.

On the internet you do need to be careful about what content and information you have your name associated with. This is a lesson, many of the young (and not so young,) have learned the hard way. Remember, once something is on the internet you can’t get it back; digital footprints are indelible so think about the effect certain material could have on yours.

For instance, some MET policemen made a Harlem Shake video recently which had serious repercussions on their careers, as their behaviour was deemed unprofessional and immature, although the video itself is seemingly harmless fun.

A smart way around this issue of not being able to share funny cat videos is to have two accounts; a private one, which only friends have access to, and a professional one.

On Facebook, you can make a page for your professional account, set it to public, and treat it as a kind of CV and platform to publicise your work. Follow employers and relevant people to showcase your professional self. Additionally, your page will come up before your personal account when people search for you meaning your professional image will be the first one people come to.

However if you are looking for a new job it might be best to discuss with potential employers within the privacy of other platforms, such as direct messaging on LinkedIn. There’s no harm in connecting with other employers, but make sure you respect your current place of work and use appropriate methods if you are looking elsewhere.

A great example of youthful social networking that led to career success is the story of Ulrike Schulz. Ulrike was a German graduate looking for a job in London. She created a Twitter account solely dedicated to her job search and professional musings, through which she found and messaged relevant contacts. This resulted in a six week paid internship in London after one of her Twitter contacts passed on her CV to colleagues at a London firm. During her internship she blogged for the company and was involved in their social media. She continued to use Twitter and other sites to network, whilst employing more traditional methods, such as passing out business cards at events and approaching business owners. Her cyber-networking efforts led her to what she calls her ‘career destiny’; a job in her dream sector- social media. Read her full account here for inspiration!

So next time you get an invitation to a 2 day conference and are thinking about it as networking opportunity, ask yourself, ‘could I get more value from investing the same amount of time online?’

Anna Pitts, is a Marketing Assistant and Online Researcher at the Graduate Recruitment Bureau. Her work involves PR and outreach and writing informative, interesting advice based articles for graduates and students. Follow her on twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

8 Things Boomers Should Know When Job Hunting

By JENNIFER MERRITT, LEARNVEST

Don't ... try harder.

You read that right. Don't.

If you've been on the job hunt for a while, with little or no success, you may have heard this platitude: Just try harder! But according to Bob Sullivan, co-author of "The Plateau Effect: Getting From Stuck to Success," it's actually the worst thing that you can do in this situation.

"When you find yourself putting more and more effort into something that’s getting less and less results, it's not a sign that you should keep trying — it’s just the opposite," says Sullivan. Of course, this isn't to say that you should stop putting in effort altogether. Rather, you should try something different, whether it's re-vamping your LinkedIn profile, networking more consistently or working with a career coach to more effectively bust through a job-hunt rut.

Do ... make your resume ageless.

Lisa Johnson Mandell was in her late 40s when she suddenly found herself without a job. Although she made sure to show off her 20-plus years of experience as an entertainment reporter on her résumé, after countless job applications went unanswered, her husband gave her the hard truth. "He said, 'Lisa, don't hate me, but you really look kind of old on paper,' " she recalls.

So Mandell removed key age indicators from her resume, such as the year she graduated from college and the lengths of time that she was employed. "As soon as I sent out this new résumé that wouldn't tell anybody how old I was, I started getting responses—I'm not kidding you—within 20 minutes," she says. "And, in two weeks, I had three full-time job offers."

The result wasn't just a new gig, either—she also wrote a book, "Career Comeback: Repackage Yourself to Get the Job You Want," in which she shares strategies for giving a resume a more youthful spin. "Somebody in their 20s looks at 20-plus years of experience and puts you in the same age group as a mother or grandmother," she says. Of course, in an ideal world, experience should trump age, but Mandell adds that "if you're really intent on getting a job, you have to make concessions."

Do ... brush up on your interviewing skills.

If you haven't interviewed in a long time, you could probably use some practice. Instead of role-playing with a too-comfortable friend, try going on a few interviews for jobs that you aren't as jazzed about "because what you don't want is to go on an interview for the job that you most want and screw up," explains Art Koff, founder of RetiredBrains.com, which connects older workers with employers. "Every interview is a learning process."

You may also want to record yourself speaking. It's a tip that David Welbourn received while making a career switch at the age of 59 from a fundraising post at a hospital to a director role at a nonprofit. His advice: "Listen to your own voice, and ask yourself: Do I have enough emotion? Do I sound like I care?"

Don't ... write off temporary or part-time work.

"Employers are particularly receptive to hiring the over-50 set on a part-time, temporary or project basis," says Koff. "The employers get experienced, reliable employees, and in most cases, they don't have to pay benefits for these positions, making these workers cost-effective."

Koff even advises reaching out to a company that you admire and offering to work on a part-time, trial basis. "It gives you a little bit of a leg up because the employer can then say, 'We can hire this guy, and if it doesn't work out, we'll let him go,' " he says.

In fact, that's exactly how Evelyn Wolovnick found her way back into the workforce after being laid off from her job at an insurance company at the age of 59. After writing a few letters to companies suggesting that they hire her on a temporary basis, she landed a part-time consulting gig with a business in Chicago. Wolovnick signed the six-month contract six years ago—and she's still happily employed.

Do ... start a blog.

Blogging about your field will help alleviate younger hiring managers' concerns about your tech-savviness, advises Mandell. "It shows that you're web savvy and that you're up-to-the-minute in your field," she says. "If you're blogging about the latest advancements going on in your field, potential employers will say, 'Wow, this person is really current.' "

Do ... give yourself a makeover.

Mandell often advises older job seekers to make an effort to look younger, like dying gray hair or shaving your head to disguise balding. "It sounds kind of vacuous, but it really can make a difference," she says.

Welbourn received similar advice during his job hunt. "Somebody mentioned to me that I should get my teeth whitened, and dress a little less formally," he recalls. "It doesn't show a lack of understanding of the corporate culture—it shows confidence in being able to be a little informal with people in an informal setting."

Don't ... ignore alternative ways to make money.

There are a number of things that you can do on the side to earn money while you look for more permanent employment, such as freelancing in your field or even participating in market research surveys. “If you're working a 30-hour side gig, we're talking about making anywhere from $1,000 to $5,000 on a monthly basis," Koff says.

There's also an added bonus to this approach: If you're forced to step away from a full-time job, you may stumble onto something different—and even more lucrative. Koff recalls the story of one man who, after being laid off in his 50s, said to his wife, "After all these years, I'm going to finally clean out my garage." He did such a great job that he now operates a garage-cleaning company that staffs five employees!

Do ... view your age as an asset.

While working with New Directions, a company that provides career transition training, Welbourn learned how he could differentiate himself from younger competition. "I got wonderful coaching about how to make the case for myself not as an older person," he says, "but as an experienced individual who was less likely to be fooled by situations, and someone with a good track record of success."

In fact, it's something that he takes into consideration when doing his own hiring. "This may sound ageist, but as a leader, I would rather hire somebody who really has good experience," he says. "Someone who can weather the ups and downs."

Read more: http://www.learnvest.com/2013/07/50-or-older-your-ultimate-job-hunt-guide/#ixzz2ZCVnp1rA

We should use, not lose, our senior brain power

By Harold Mitchell

There's a lot of talk these days about work/life balance and I think we have mostly got it all wrong. Work is life and life is work. It's not a choice between the two - it's about choosing to be happy and positive no matter what we are doing or how old we are. There's an old Zen Buddhist saying, "Before enlightenment - chop wood and carry water. After enlightenment - chop wood and carry water''. My 92-year-old dad lives this literally. Last weekend he told me how happy he is that winter is approaching up in the mountains where he lives. It means that he can get out his trusty axe and split wood for the fire. He's an expert and you need to be. The trick is to turn the axe head a millisecond before it hits the block of wood. Three kilos of fast-moving razor-sharp axe head in inexperienced hands can do a lot of damage. More than 80 years of log-splitting will probably ensure my dad makes 100. Age is no barrier to him keeping the home fires burning by working each day. The same is true for my once-a-year lunch partner, octogenarian Peter Clemenger, the former head of our greatest advertising agency. He is as active as ever and as sharp as my old man's axe. As is emeritus professor Derek Denton, founder of the Florey Institute, one of the world's greatest neuroscience facilities and located here in Australia. At 88, he is overflowing with ideas that people all over the world are still listening to. I had a cup of tea with him earlier this week and he told me about the latest experiments being undertaken by his research group, which includes brilliant scientists both here and in America. They are doing world-leading work on addiction, something that profoundly affects almost every aspect of our society. Passing the so-called age of retirement does not mean that we have to enter the age of uselessness or even idleness. Just have a look at the busy, creative and internationally important work of that great Australian Jim Wolfensohn. The former head of the World Bank is still on international boards and apart from his amazing business acumen, those who know Jim, marvel at the way he took up the cello at 51 - some 45 years after the brain cells were at their peak for picking up new things. At an earlier time, as part of the organising group of the outstanding Alfred Deakin Lecture Series just on a decade ago, I sat listening to Baroness Susan Greenfield, who at 62 is still one of the world's leading neuroscientists. She explained the functioning of the brain very simply - "use it or lose it". And that's the message for Australia - use the experienced brain power of our senior people or lose out on the essential ingredient that money and youth can't buy - wisdom. Too often, we hear younger people saying ''he's too old'', and in the advertising and marketing industry it's commonplace for the jeans clad, sneaker-wearing, ponytailed hipsters to try to rely on raw youthfulness to get them through. Sure we need the youth but we also need the wisdom of age. Some time ago I was a speaker at a conference in Sydney about China with the Chinese Minister for Propaganda and Bob Hawke. I felt like a youngster with a lot to learn as the 84-year-old former prime minister engaged with the 81-year-old Chinese leader, a member of the 18th Politburo Standing Committee. I can tell you without a doubt, Hawkie has not lost it. So with ANZAC Day just passed, we must continue to be mindful of all of those who gave their lives for this country. We need to remember that the purpose of their great sacrifice was to enable us to use our freedom well. And in my book, that means understanding and accepting that life is work and service. By the way, you might remember that $428 haircut I got in New York. Well, it didn't last, I had to get another one last week! Harold Mitchell is an executive director of Aegis. Source:The Age http://news.olderworkers.com.au/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=326:we-should-use-not-lose-our-senior-brain-power-&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=31

Is Ageism Getting Worse?

By Sarah Stevenson

 

A recent Princeton study on the causes of ageism reveals that we’ve still got a long way to go in the fight against age-related negative stereotypes.

Ageism against seniors can’t be defined simply as prejudice against older adults. Researchers are finding that ageism is a complex phenomenon consisting of a range of negative attitudes toward seniors. We may not like to think about it, but the effect of ageism is detectable throughout our society: in the family and home environment, in the media, in the working world, and even in the realm of government policy. And if we don’t address the issue openly, it’s bound to get a whole lot more complicated when the considerable population of baby boomers - the same ones who used to say “don’t trust anyone over thirty”- begins to reach their own golden years.

What Is Ageism?

The general definition of ageism is any sort of age-based prejudice. According to the Assisted Living Foundation of America, ageism against seniors occurs when “societal norms marginalize seniors, treat them with disrespect, make them feel unwelcome and otherwise generalize as if they were all the same.”

 

Negative stereotypes about older adults may be all too familiar: they are “slow,” they have poor memories, they’re afraid of the modern world. Researchers refer to these as “descriptive stereotypes,” or generalizations about the way seniors supposedly are - in contrast to “prescriptive stereotypes,” which generalize about how seniors should be, and often lead to discriminatory behaviors and practices.

In a recent study by psychologists at Princeton University, these prescriptive stereotypes were examined more closely and “unpacked” to see what more we can learn about how American society views the elderly. According to an article from Princeton’s Office of Communications, the scientists found that prescriptive stereotypes focus on three central issues:

• Succession: “the idea that older people should move aside from high-paying jobs and prominent social roles to make way for younger people.”
• Identity: “the idea that older people shouldn’t attempt to act younger than they are.”
• Consumption: “the idea that older people shouldn’t consume so many scarce resources such as health care.”

Why the Study of Ageism is Important

Studying ageism is about to become even more critical as we face the “graying” of our population; older adults are more numerous and visible than ever before, says the Princeton article. Ageism has far-reaching effects on the mental and emotional health of seniors and their dignity, and it can lead to discriminatory practices in housing and social policy, resulting in a negative impact on seniors’ quality of life. In extreme cases, notes ALFA, such attitudes about seniors can even result in elder abuse.

The Princeton researchers are well aware of the growing importance of the issue of ageism: “It’s not hard to read The New York Times or The Wall Street Journal and see that as the baby boomers are getting older, age-discrimination cases are on the rise and worries are growing about the long-term sustainability of Social Security and Medicare,” graduate student Michael North said. “The academic literature hasn’t really spoken to these questions.”

Debunking Stereotypes about Older Adults

Getting past our ingrained stereotypes about seniors, the researchers say, will help our society as a whole move past outdated ideas and social policies.

“Talking about these issues helps you find constructive ways to address them,” said North. One potentially productive avenue of research, for instance, relies on a crucial distinction between the “young-old” - those seniors who are still relatively healthy and who may still be working - and the “old-old,” who may be less healthy and more impaired. Learning more about the differences between these two subtypes can help us better serve the needs of a diverse and growing senior population.

http://www.aplaceformom.com/blog/2013-04-29-is-ageism-getting-worse/