Attorney at Law
Recent college graduate; new graduate; one-to-two years work experience; within 18 months of a graduate school program. Aerospace giant Raytheon’s job postings listed qualifications like these. A class action lawsuit filed in June in federal court in Boston claims those job postings violate federal and Massachusetts age discrimination laws.
Named plaintiff; Mark Goldstein, who is 67 years old, had around 40 years of relevant experience, an MBA, a professional certification in cyber security, and previously held a security clearance. Between 2019 and 2023 he applied for seven positions with Raytheon. He was never hired and, in fact, did not receive even a single interview.
The lawsuit alleges that RTX Corporation (formerly Raytheon) refused to hire workers for many positions unless the applicants were recent graduates, which prevented most qualified older applicants from getting or competing for those jobs and deterred many others from applying. Raytheon vowed “we will actively defend our hiring practices.” However, a month before the filing, its former global head of talent acquisition stated that about 25% of all recently hired employees were new or recent graduates and that percentage had grown in recent years.
Companies sometimes believe that they need to hire younger workers to compete. For example, a 2018 Pro Publica article scrutinized IBM’s internal planning documents to reveal a belief that it needed a large percentage of younger workers to compete in emerging technologies areas. Boston Attorney Shannon Liss-Reardon, who represented hundreds of IBM workers pursuing age discrimination claims, told the New York Times that “these filings reveal that top IBM executives were explicitly plotting with one another to oust older workers from IBM’s workforce in order to make room for millennial employees.” A belief that customers prefer younger workers also leads some companies to focus on hiring younger applicants. For example, in an age discrimination case I am currently litigating, while announcing her retirement to all employees, a CEO in her 60s said the company was seeking a younger and more diverse audience, adding that the company needed a “younger, more diverse staff.”
A recent AARP survey found that almost 80% of workers aged 55 and older reported observing or experiencing age discrimination in their workplaces. HR professionals agree. In March 2024, Resume Builder.com surveyed 1,000 hiring managers and found that:
- 42% said they consider age when reviewing resumes
- 33% acknowledged a bias against senior candidates
- 40% said they are less likely to hire an applicant with an elderly appearance
Americans are living longer, are healthier, and are deciding to continue working out of financial necessity or because they enjoy working. For example, 19% of Americans aged 65 and older work. That’s double compared to 35 years ago. The concept of retirement is evolving to include part-time work and “second acts.” Projections show that the number of older workers will continue to increase over the next decade. Adults aged 65 and older were 6.6% of the workforce in 2022. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that number will increase to 8.6% in 2032. It also predicts that older adults will account for 57% of labor force growth over that 10-year period.
We are a rapidly aging population. A record number of Americans will turn 65 this year and will continue to do so through 2027. In his recent Esquire article entitled “The Seismic Shift That’s About to Change the American Workplace,”, Michael Clinton observed that this phenomenon “is creating a historic talent drain as huge numbers of Baby Boomers retire. There is an obvious strategy to counter this trend: Encourage more of those older workers to extend their careers.” Recognizing this “brain drain” is starting to convince employers to recognize that they need to find ways to hire and retain older workers. To do so, they will first need to abandon stereotypical and outdated attitudes and adopt a mindset captured by Janine Vanderburg, from Changing the Narrative, a leading anti-ageism initiative. In her February, 2024 article “Thinking Differently About Older Workers: What Recruiters Want Employees to Know,” she said: “Employers should intentionally ‘flip’ the conversation about older job seekers. Specifically consider the valuable traits older job seekers can bring to an organization:
- Maturity and leadership
- Institutional industry knowledge and connections
- Experience, accomplishments and successes related to the roles you are hiring
- Mentorship experience for younger professionals in your organization
- Specific skills, experiences and accomplishments related to your organizations challenges and goals.”
Employers will need to remove ageist language in job postings like “early career professional” or “energetic, digital native.” Vanderburg advises employers to “use language that is age neutral that can cast a wide net to recruit job seekers and avoid unfair blanket assumptions about how old someone has to be to fill a role.” Websites and recruiting materials should not exclusively portray young people.
In a Next Avenue article “A CEO’s Post Praising Older Workers Goes Viral”, Richard Eisenberg discussed a LinkedIn post by Tom Hunt, a 35-year-old CEO of a British marketing company, which began “I hired someone over 55.” Hunt admitted that, before hiring the person, he thought “he’s too qualified” and he “won’t be able to do the job.” But after hiring the individual, he concluded “he’s an absolute pleasure to work with” and “made a huge difference.” Hunt ended his post by saying, “if you want great talent, don’t ignore the ‘experienced’.”