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POPULAR
FALLACIES AND SPINS
Potentially,
aging issues are political hot potatoes. Policy makers strive to avoid them, by distorting
the facts and with tactics intended to silence us.
FALSE:Older
workers are long-term unemployed, enrolled in government funded programs,
working part-time or sporadically in minimum wage, dead-end, boring jobs
only because they are voluntarily retired, disabled or lack the knowledge,
skills, abilities, or desire for more complex or attractive jobs.
FACTS:
.People of all age groups vary in our talents, skills, abilities, education,
experience and needs. Many older Americans want to work Many
cannot economically afford to retire. This is especially true
of those without independent income, whose income comes from reduced
Social Security (because they were forced to opt for reduced benefits
prior to age 65), Moreover, many are suffering protracted boredom
and deprivation, because we are excluded from the labor
force because of our age.
By being denied employment opportunities,
we are excluded from opportunities, to use, develop and update our skills,
conditions that incapacitate us in competing in a rapidly changing labor
force.
Absent immediate intervention, many
of us are destined to rely on families or welfare for subsistence.
Furthermore, protracted economic deprivation and boredom impairs
health, and, thus, escalates the rising medical costs for older
citizens. Impoverished people cannot pay medical bills, so the costs
are levied on the public.
This nation can realistically envisage
increasingly visible and intense pandemic inter- generational chaos,
as discretionary income of younger generations are progressively
cut to pay the rising costs of supporting people who resent them
for enjoying opportunities that we covet and are denied because of
ageism.
FALSE:
Federally funded older workers programs can help most people over age 55
get skills training and suitable employment.
FACT:
Programs,
funded under Title V of the Older Americans Act, assist some low-income,
long-term, unemployed people over age 55 who are at less than 125% of the
poverty line. They are operated by non-profit organization and local
governments under contract with the federal government . They
provide training for nurses aides and in rudimentary computer
application skills(e.g: for data entry jobs).
A few enrollees, who own reliable
automobiles and are willing to routinely drive to several Georgia
counties, earn $7.00 per hour plus 34cents per mile for a 24
hour work week. Most enrollees are placed in dead end, minimum
wage hard-to-fill jobs, high-burnout jobs or warehoused; in part-time,
minimum wage welfare traps, assigned to mind-stifling, repetitive
tasks in non-profit organizations.
Secondly, most staff are under
age 55, while enrollees are over age 55.
There are clear financial incentives for this pattern. First,
each enrollee is added justification for increased government funding,
and their wages are paid from the federal grants. Staff salaries
must be paid from the organizations' budgets; In accounting
terms, enrollees produce revenue; staff are costs.
The more enrollees recruited and retained, the greater is the
job security and career opportunities of the (younger) staff.
Labor market ageism cultivates a flourashing crop of impoverished,
capitive consumers for these programs.
Third, these programs serve significant
political and economic functions. Aging programs are operated
by powerful special interest groups that politicians are behooved to appease.
They provide a market a cheap resource of workers for high burnout
jobs, and for nursing homes beleagured by a tight labor market of available
workers for the lowest paying, least attractive jobs.
They provide elected
officials a channel for disposing of outraged, hopeless older workers and
elevate the number of employed people over age 55 in the Bureau of
Labor Statistics' reports. Additionally, they funnel
federal funds into local communities, provide staff jobs for younger
workers and cushy, lucrative positions for rewarding political cronies.
All of these benefits are contingent upon an available supply of deprived,
captive, unemployed older workers.
Ironically, in programs supposedly
funded to mitigate the social and economic impact of invidious age discrimination,
deprived older workers are expected to compliantly adjust to age-based
underclass status, and support the younger staff who are afforded
rewards that are denied to them because of their age.
As in many welfare program food chains,
special interest groups and the staff of the provider organizations are
amply rewarded, while the intended beneficiaries
are maintained with the crumbs at the bottom of the chain
FALSE
The EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission) is an effective
advocate for age discrimination victims.
FACT:
The
EEOC is an administrative agency that reviews age discrimination complaints
and issues guidelines to employers about how to dispose of older workers
without running into legal problems. Because of the courts set formidable
obstacles to proving age discrimination, the EEOC is powerless to
help most of us.
That explains why they find "no reasonable
cause" in more than 90% of their cases Even cases that go to court and
eventually win, victory came more than five years and hundreds
of thousands of dollars in legal fees after the case was filed. However,
it gives politicians a place for passing the buck, and where outraged older
workers can t vent their anger, and are delayed in learning
that , nothing practical can be done for them. For more information about
the EEOC, visit The Cooling System by clicking the bronze link
on the left navagation bar.
FALSE:All
people who say they are voluntarily retired must be voluntary retired.
FACT:
Significant is the distinction between voluntarily retired people and discouraged
older workers.
Quoting Websters Ninth Collegiate Dictionary,
to retire is "to withdraw from one's position or occupation...to
conclude one's working or professional career",
As defined by theU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics,
discouraged
workers are
persons not classified as in the
labor force as employed or unemployed, and include unemployed persons who
would work in a job, but have given up searching for jobs because
they believe that none are available to them. . U.S.
Bureau of Labor Statistics. In U.S. Census Bureau Statistical Abstracts
Of The United States, 1999 --Section 13, pg 408.
Retirees have voluntarily withdrawn
from the labor force, Discouraged workers would
work if suitable jobs were available to them, but have
withdrawn from the labor force as a result of numerous futile
job searches, Whereas the voluntary retiree has chosen
to retire, discouraged
older workers are have not voluntarily withdrawn; they are
excluded from the labor force because of their age.
An inestimable proportion of discouraged
older workers are likely to say they are voluntarily retired, although
if suitable employment was available to them, they would immediately accept
it. Some may feign satisfaction with part-time jobs,
when they limit their working hours because of the unpleasant
options for older workers.
Claims of being "retired"
or disabled are popular socially approved face savers for people
who are embarrassed about being unable to secure employment.
whereas calling oneself a discouraged older worker, due to age discrimination,
begets frustrating run-arounds and denigrating criticism.
GAMES
POLITICIANS AND BUREAUCRATS PLAY TO SILENCE COMPLAINING OLDER CITIZENS.
THE
MISPLACED SHAME AND BLAME GAMES
Discouraged older workers, who are embarrassed
about being unable to find suitable employment, may attempt
to save face by saying they are voluntarily retired,
While their demands on elected representatives to alleviate these abominations
are discounted or upbraided, claims of voluntary retirement is socially
approved.
The same explanation applies to some discouraged
older workers who claim disabilities. Disability is socially
and politically acceptable reason for limiting work options or leaving
the labor force, while claims of neglected labor market ageism begets
reproach. Likewise, some disenfranchised oldsters may call themselves "consultants".
Tragically, such people are unwittingly,
unnecessarily harming themselves and others. The notion of saving
face connotes a need to hide something shameful.. But the shame and
blame belongs with our elected representatives, for their wanton
betrayal and willful negligence of their moral responsibilities to
their deprived older constituents.
Dump The Problems
on The Families Game: Let Them Fight Each Other.
When discouraged
older workers, they are likely to be asked for information
about their famillies. We are not legally obligated to cooperate
If we disclose this information, we
can reasonably expect our adult offspring to get telephone calls from professional
meddlers(i.e. social workers), perhaps at their workplaces, with
a sermon designed to send them on a guilt trip about their moral obligations
for our welfare. The moral obligations may include financial assistance,
if needed. Yes, politicians thereby shift responsibilities
for these consequences of their negligence from them
to the victims' families.
Family members
with limited capacities to resolve these economic problems
of ageism are likely to become distressed by this interference in
their lives, as are newly poor , discouraged older workers who live with
constant anger ensuing from economic incapcitation and envy of opportunities
afforded younger people.
While this
frequently used strategy foreseeably pits family members against
each other, effectually channels discouraged older workers' compliants and anger to the familings -- away
from policy makers who strive to ignore these issues.
The Blame The
Victim Game reflects the well-publicised battered wife syndrome
The woman says that she fell down or ran into a door to protect the man
who injured her. The secret(face-saver) protects her from the man's
shame
that he shifts onto her ( i.e. she deserved the beatings,
if she can be more appealing to him, the beatings would stop).
However, the beatings persist with impunity. In other words, she
is enabling him to batter her. Likewise, deprived older workers'
silence and face savers are enabling politicians to deprive and exploit
us with impunity.
The Bad Attitude
Silencing Game
A variant of the Blame-the- Victim Game,
designed to set unwary people on the defensive, is accusing complaining
older workers of having a "bad attitude". Put another way, if
you persist in complaining and refusing to silently adjust and act as if
you rightfully belong in an age-based underclass, you have a "bad attitude".
The intent of this ploy is, of course, to intimidate us into silence.
THE PATIENCE
PUT OFFA popular trick for squirming out of dealing with
the problems and maintaining desired behavior is to give us something to
hope for. This is done by advising us to have patience -- with infinite
timelines for results. Thus, while younger people are getting
jobs and salaries we covet, we are told to have patience for an indefinite
period of time, undoubtedly forever. But until we discover the facts,
this tactic sustains hope, and even delusional hope is a powerful
controller of behavior.
THE ANGER ATTACK
GAMEAnother variant of the Blame-The-Victim Game is accusing
deprived, complaining older citizens of being angry. The goal
is to put us on the defensive for being envious of favored younger generations
and angry about being deprived because we have been dumped into an underclass
because of our age. On the other hand, for so long as we hide
our anger and disgust, we are assumed to be satisfied with existent
conditions, and nothing needs to be done.
CONCLUSIONS AND NEEDED SOLUTIONS
The Games Will Cease To Work When We Stop
Playing On Our Oponents' teams.
When we allow ourselves to be seduced into cooperating with these games,
we are playing on our adversaries's team. When
we stop playing these games, , the games will cease to work, and no longer
can they silence us. Then, policy makers will be compelled to implement
remedies that will alleviate labor market ageism.
Policy Makers
Must Rethink Ageism Issues.
Since it is in the public interest to
curb the skyrocketing expense and festering social chaos by keeping
older citizens healthy and economically self sufficient.
elected officials are behooved to rethink current denigrating treatment
of older citizens and provide the same incentives for sustaining middle
class values and work ethics as afforded younger people.
Replacement of costly, mind-stifling. exploitative programs, based
on stereotypical age classifications with equal job opportunities
is the needed solution.
Reparation
and Affirmative Action Instead of Bigger Bureaucracies, are Cost-effective
Solutions.
Reparation is owed victims of ageism who,
due to protracted age-based exclusion from the labor force, rather
than costly programs that perpetuate our underclass status, and harrassing
guilt trips on families that, at most, produce only cosmetic effects.
Affirmative Action, to mitigate the
pervasive effects of age discrimination is desperately needed.
Moreover, by extending job opportunities for people over
age 55, enforced affirmative action would progressively reduce the need and
outlay for reparation and costly social programs.
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