Another reason to retire early.. avoid age discrimination

Anything to do with the traditional world of get a degree, get a job as well as its alternatives
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chasebrooklyn1985
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Joined: Tue Jun 25, 2019 5:59 pm

Re: Another reason to retire early.. avoid age discrimination

Post by chasebrooklyn1985 »

I read this too. Very discouraging especially since I'm contemplating changing careers... going into coding, yikes!

EdithKeeler
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Re: Another reason to retire early.. avoid age discrimination

Post by EdithKeeler »

My boss recently retired and was looking for a part time "retirement job," maybe 25-30 hours a week, doing something mindless. He was surprised to find out hardly anyone was interested in him at all. Like Sam's Club, the library, places like that.

classical_Liberal
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Re: Another reason to retire early.. avoid age discrimination

Post by classical_Liberal »

A friend of mine's husband has a painting business. Sometimes he'll hire day laborers from one of the local employment shops to pressure spay. It's pretty physical work, especially over 8+ hours, so they tend to "pace" themselves, to put is politely. He started paying his 70 yr old father-in-law to come in and do the job with the day laborers for an hour or so each day. When the FIL shows up and silently starts kicking the young guy's proverbial butt's in work, they pick it up, big time! :lol:

More seriously, age discrimination is real. I think this is just one more reason to have a variety skills.

jacob
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Re: Another reason to retire early.. avoid age discrimination

Post by jacob »

@cL - Reminds me of a management story from---I think it was UPS(?) Apparently the night shift were suffering endless problems trying to get the packages stowed on the cargo planes on time. Many things were tried. What ultimately solved it was to change the pay schedule so workers could go home after the job was done with a full pay. This worked far better than various incentives and procedural guidelines.

Also see, Parkinson's law.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Another reason to retire early.. avoid age discrimination

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

I think this is a terrible reason to retire early. The trick is to figure out which factors associated with age are being discriminated against. For instance, on dating sites older women are passed over more often, but if an older woman shows cleavage in her photo, her numbers will approach those of much younger females. My N=1 trial verified.

EdithKeeler
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Re: Another reason to retire early.. avoid age discrimination

Post by EdithKeeler »

I think this is a terrible reason to retire early. The trick is to figure out which factors associated with age are being discriminated against. For instance, on dating sites older women are passed over more often, but if an older woman shows cleavage in her photo, her numbers will approach those of much younger females. My N=1 trial verified.
I don't think showing cleavage at the job interview is the way to go.... :D

I'm starting to the feel the age differences at work (I'm 54). I was just talking to my shrink about this today. A lot of it's just me, being older--I don't have time or patience or interest in the bullshit any more. At this stage of life and work, I want to come in, do the job, and go home. I don't want to hear excuses from anyone, and I most definitely don't want to be told how to do the work by someone who's younger... and who's not actually done the work that I do (happened today as a matter of fact). I think older people are seen by others as "lower energy," when in fact it's probably lack of interest in the peripheral bullshit that goes on in an office, and the "make nice" stuff and the pure politics. I really don't think I would have gotten my recent promotion if they hadn't been in a jam and needed me; I feel confident that that's the last promotion I will get there. I sort of looked around the other day and realized that EVERYONE is younger than me--some by just a year or two, many by quite a bit. Older people (over 55) have left in droves, and I probably will follow as soon as I can.

I suppose from the standpoint of those doing the discriminating, it's sort of valid. (Not that it's OK to discriminate solely on the basis of age, that's not what I mean). But if it seems clear that the person being looked at is some ways counter to the culture (ie, not interested in bullshit meetings anymore or the ass-kissing of marketing, or whatever) then maybe they aren't really a good fit. I interview a lot of people who have the skills, but for one reason or another aren't a good fit. I think it's possible that people over a certain age (because of things they've seen and just their point in life) aren't always a good fit anymore. And I think that's something we older people need to be aware of--I have a tendency to wear my feelings (and impatience with bullshit) on my sleeve... and it doesn't always serve me well.

IlliniDave
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Re: Another reason to retire early.. avoid age discrimination

Post by IlliniDave »

A bit of deja vu reading this thread for me.

Not sure about discrimination, but among colleagues who are my contemporaries, no doubt we sense it's time to pass the torch. There's a little of the torch being taken from us, but it's balanced by an equal difficulty in finding our juniors who are willing not just to take the torch, but to carry it.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Another reason to retire early.. avoid age discrimination

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

I think sometimes the problem is less age, but total time in the same field. A common nightmare theme in our culture is finding yourself back in high school. Similarly, forum members dread the possibility of retiring with not quite enough funds and then having to find themselves interviewing for a job two levels down from the last one they left and struggling to regain competency in a field in which they were once top-of-game competent, but now everything seems vaguely unfamiliar, and all the cast members have changed.

OTOH, if you reboot yourself in a completely different field, although you will lose some level of acquired competence (many skills transfer widely), you will gain the benefit of fresh energy and interest, and the possibility of hitting a new S-Curve right at the sweet spot.

I know this may seem like a strange perspective for a member of this forum, but I found myself sort of envying a fellow teacher who after a messy complete financial disaster of a divorce brought down a business she ran with her ex, went back and got her master's and started a new profession at the age of 60. I was surprised to learn that she was 62, because she was fit and dressed in a very youthful manner, but one day in the lunchroom she revealed that she was very happy because she had just qualified for a mortgage to buy a new little house for herself, even though she was "too old." I actually had a similar impression of an acquaintance who was actually starting all over again in his 50s after serving some time in prison. He was working his ass off renovating old houses, and the fresh possibilities of a fresh S-curve made him vibe more 29 than 59.

IOW, it is my take that the main benefit of achieving FI would be free range to pick your next S-Curve, NOT the ability to simply rest on some slowly slumping plateau.

thebbqguy
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Re: Another reason to retire early.. avoid age discrimination

Post by thebbqguy »

I've seen this trend up close.

I have started learning new skills, trying to present a curious persona, building a larger network and using my leadership skills to promote change / improve processes. Of all of those building a larger network is vital. You can leverage your network to help you should it be needed now or in the future.

Some of the trend toward "younger" is to save on insurance expense, salary, pension expense, re-training, etc.

My advice is to work as long as you can but realize that some day the time will come to transition willingly or unwillingly.

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