DISCRIMINATION TACTICS

    The tactics being employed today in business to discriminate against older workers are sinister, and most of them completely legal under current law.  You must remember that every day is a new day to business, so what they do today is forgotten and "yesterday's issue" tomorrow.

   REORGANIZATION

   The first way that business eliminates aging workers is through reorganization.  By simply restructuring the business and eliminating the needs of the "new department" for the services of its aging workers, is simply write you out of the equation.  People who have dedicated many years of selfless effort on behalf of companies, are just written off and dumped like yesterday's garbage by the corporate reorganization.

    In many cases, they are transferred into departments where the functions will be "outsourced" later to other companies or divisions that exist thousands of miles from the worker's home, forcing them to either give up their jobs or completely re-structure their lives.  They are given the choice of moving or losing their jobs.

    If they accept the change, it is no guarantee that their services will continue after the move.  Downsizing in the departments is simply the next step in removing the aging worker from the workplace if they are unsuccessful in coercing the worker into quitting to avoid moving across the country.

PARALLELING

   Paralleling is the more sinister technique currently being used.  In paralleling an aging worker, the business managers "offer" the worker a "parallel transfer" into a job with equal benefits and stature of the job they are in.  Shortly after they are "paralleled", the job description of the parallel position will be changed to a job that does not fit the qualifications of the transferred employee.  While it may take several months, the transferred employee will develop a string of "unacceptable performance" criteria which will lead to them being fired or "downsized" due to elimination of the parallel position or their unacceptable performance there.  It leaves the worker wondering "What Happened?", while the business owners go on about their business, completely confident in the fact that they are legally clear of any liability for discrimination.

CODING OF JOB ADVERTISEMENTS

    The coding of job advertisements is a suttle method of allowing  Human Resource Departments to restrict the hiring of personnel to workers under age forty.  Using phrases such as "energetic, able to work in a fast-paced environment" or "vibrant work atmosphere", the human resource departments clue the personnel services to  restrict the submission of job applicants to those under age 40.

     In one instance, for example, the ad was placed for someone with "seven years experience, but no more than 16 years experience".  For anyone who can do simple math, a graduate usually is 22 to 24 years of age.  Add 16 years to the "experience level" of the graduate, and the person could be no more than 38-40 years of age.

INVASIONS OF PRIVACY

    During the interview process for a job, the Human Resources department will make lengthy inquiries into private information regarding applicants and require them to grant access to private information that is not legal to require for the job application process.

    For instance, it is not legal for a company to check your credit without your permission, and they are by law required to notify you if you are denied the job because of the credit information. The law requires the opportunity for  you to offer an explanation regarding the validity of the credit information.  For a complete review of the law and your rights under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, go to http://www.ftc.gov/os/statutes/fcra.htm and review your rights and the credit reporting agency's responsibilities.  Section 615 is of particular interest (and neglect by employers) using credit reports to disqualify employee applicants.  Few if any do what is required by law as far as the notification procedures being followed by sending proper follow-up paperwork to employee applicants who are rejected.  This should be actionable in court.

    A company may not include or require a picture of you with an application.  This is considered to be a method of determining your age, and discriminates against you.  Once the job is offered, they may require a picture of you as an employee.  Note:  if the picture is kept in the file, why doesn't that discriminate if you leave the place of employment and return later to apply for another job?

     If they ask for your date of graduation from high school, college, or university, it is a method of "dating" the applicant to determine age.  It's pretty easy to determine age if you have a graduation date, add the years of experience, and then  make a reasonable guess about the average age of graduates.

 

     To understand where you should go from this point on, go to http://www.prairielaw.com/articles/article.asp?subid=25&channelid=1&articleid=1260

This article describes the procedure for setting up your discriminaion claim.