They’re savvy, reliable, and uber-qualified. Why can’t over-fifties find jobs?

IF

you’re middle-aged or older, and you’re job hunting, prepare for an uphill battle. If you’re middle-aged and older and you’re job hunting in an industry that sells products associated with style and image, get ready for a hard reality check.

My mother moved to a different city, and one of the first things she did after settling in was job hunt. She’d worked for many years at a high-end home goods store, and she was good at what she did.

My mother always had flair. She decorated our whole house on her own, down to the last detail.

Everything she does is tasteful and elegant. She knows how to set a beautiful table. She knows the perfect gift you need to take for your hostess. She knows how to choose the right glasses to complement your Shabbos dishes. At the store where she worked, she was able to size up every customer and show her the dishes and tableware that worked for her aesthetic. She knows all the brands and patterns. She’s also really good at forging a connection with people, which makes her a really good salesperson.

So she thought it was a no-brainer to look for a job in the same industry.

She applied for several sales positions, but received no response.

Having a connection at one of the places where she applied, I decided to make some inquiries.

“She’s not a good fit for us,” I was told.

But this was a store that was exactly the same kind of store where my mother had worked for more than ten years. She knew all about their merchandise. To me this answer meant only one thing — they thought my mother was too old for the job.

She’s not a good fit was code for we don’t want to hire someone that old.

This wasn’t the first time I’d encountered this kind of ageism. A few years ago, my sheitelmacher asked if I’d be interested in working as her receptionist.

“Everyone is always leaving me,” she complained. “They’re always running home to catch buses.”

I knew this job wasn’t for me — I freelance and some of my kids are still young, but my mother was looking for additional work hours.

“What about my mother?” I asked her. “Why wouldn’t you take someone that age? They certainly don’t have to rush home for little kids.”

“I have a certain image I need to portray,” she told me. “I need my employees to look a certain way.”

I know this isn’t true for all stores everywhere. I’ve shopped for clothes and home goods in places that employed women in their fifties and sixties, and they were well-informed and honest. My local linen store is staffed by saleswomen that age, as is my local home goods stores.

Honestly, I prefer a salesperson closer to my age over someone who’s so much younger. Maybe a younger person is more tuned in to trends, but I’m past trends, and I want to be helped by someone who understands that.

Older people do.

But some of the stores in my mother’s new town don’t seem to get that. I’ve heard about stores with a predominantly younger floor staff.  I’ve heard about stores who won’t hire anyone over 40. I’ve heard about a store that dismissed their entire sales force and hired a younger staff. These stores opted instead for a staff of fresh-faced young people, with long wavy wigs, wearing clothes you certainly can’t anymore. They’re animated and vibrate with a bouncy energy that seems like a foreign language. They tell you which throw, diffuser, baby linen, fruit bowl, or tray is a must.

Maybe because it’s a town of younger people, the townspeople see an older person and assume she’s out of touch, as out of style as that dress or vase they’ve come to replace. Maybe having younger salespeople boosts sales.

I can’t help but notice the age segregation in my mother’s new town. My mother lives in a retirement community. The rest of the neighborhoods in the town seem divided by age. With this kind of divide, it seems almost logical some stores won’t hire older people. They don’t see them on their streets, and they don’t want to see them in their stores.

But older people bring a lot to the table. They bring wisdom and a people skills work set, and often have more patience and tolerance than younger people.

I’m not sure how to fix this. The most logical solution seems to be to provide more opportunities for mingling between the generations. It’s difficult to do this in a place that’s so age segregated, but one of the most logical places to start would be in the retail business, as this is where the most interaction happens.

As long as they don’t, they perpetuate the bias, and as long as there is this bias, you won’t get the benefits an older, more experienced person brings to the table.

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 955)