If You Are Over 50 and Get Fired, Do This Fast
There is a bias against older workers in the job market. This has come as a shock to older workers who got laid off in 2008-9. They still have trouble finding work.
Why this comes as a shock is something of a mystery. Employers hire younger people because they can get them cheap.
An older worker is used to high pay and position. Then, one fine day, he gets fired. All of a sudden, he’s the equivalent of a kid again, but with none of the kid’s resiliency. The oldsters pretend that they are not used goods — overpriced. They don’t adjust fast enough. They don’t cut their pay horizon. They don’t spend 8 hours a day in job searching. They don’t know how to use their contacts. They don’t have a fallback position.
They thought they were invulnerable. They weren’t.
The New York Times reveals that a recent report issued by the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that about a third of people ages 55 to 64 who lost their jobs from 2007 through 2008 had found full-time employment by early 2009. In contrast, about 40% of people ages 25 to 54 had.
Is that a great difference? No.
So, what’s the problem? Oldsters simply refuse to get out there and compete. They are shell-shocked. They just cannot believe that they just got fired.
A youngster knows that he is expendable. An oldster does not adjust fast enough. Then his skills get rusty. He gets less employable.
An oldster can cut his salary requests. He can use his years of experience as a sales tool. He can seek work as an independent contractor.
Instead, hundreds of thousands of them are going onto Social Security at age 62. They get low welfare payments. They could have worked for minimum wage at a fast food restaurant. Instead, they go on the dole.
At some wage, there is work. Oldsters refuse to cut their expectations. “This is beneath me,” they think.
Then they get rejected because they are overqualified. What does “overqualified” mean? It means they will not fit in. It means they will feel discriminated against. It means they will be ready to go on the dole.
Better to hire a youngster who has no illusions.
If you get fired, waste no time. Let your contacts know immediately. Ask for help finding leads.
If you do not have a blog site, get one. Start posting articles. You should be doing this long before you get fired.
Continue reading here.
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Published on June 12, 2012. The original is here.