In a San Francisco federal court, the Communication Workers of America union recently expanded the scope of the class action suit they filed last December against some of the country’s largest employers — a diverse list of companies that included Amazon, T-Mobile, Capital One, and Enterprise Rent-a-Car — accused of deliberately targeting their Facebook ads to exclude older workers. A ProPublica investigation shows that IBM has quietly pushed out upwards of 20,000 aging workers over the past five years. And, for all that has been written about the woeful lack of diversity and the “bro culture” that prevail in the tech industry, Silicon Valley’s 150 biggest tech companies have faced more accusations of age bias over the past decade than racial or gender bias.
How Do We Combat Ageism? By Valuing Wisdom as Much as Youth.
Although discrimination against people 40 and older is prohibited by law, a recent survey by the AARP showed that two-thirds of workers between the ages of 45 and 74 said they have seen or experienced ageism. And Silicon Valley has faced more accusations of ageism than any other form of discrimination. At the core of age discrimination is an assumption that older workers are less valuable — and that’s the attitude we need to change if we’re going to stop ageism in the workplace. There is a generation of older workers with wisdom and experience, specialized knowledge, and unparalleled ability to teach, coach, and council who could pair with these ambitious young leaders to create businesses that are built to endure. Valuing their wisdom is one place to start — and one way to end ageism, which is the one “ism” that is going to affect us all.