Is age discrimination a thing?

[Gnoekeos]

So here's the thing, I turn 18 this year which makes me legally an adult. At that point I will be going to college, working a job, paying bills, the whole deal. That means I have to be responsible for my own actions and choices, otherwise I end up homeless, or dead. At the same time, in Ontario I can't legally drink or smoke until I'm 19... what changes in a year that makes it suddenly not a problem for me to harm myself with substances? I'm not sure.

you think that's bad at 18 I was legally responsible enough to sign away years of my life to the service, handle millions of dollars worth of equipment, get decently high level security clearance and be trained to kill people with a variety of weapons and explosives then participate in warfare yet had to wait 3 more years till the government said I was responsible enough to have a beer legally... lol

The thing with that is that if you prove to be totally irresponsible then its really easy to discharge you from the military and keep you from messing with the millions of dollars of equipment but once you're legally able to drink there is very little put in place to keep you from destroying your life.

 

[aba1]

When I was in highschool working at Price Choppers I remember that the managers
(A. Treated me like shit
(B. Paid me like shit

It was always assumed I was just some idiot kid who didn't know anything and was always trying to take advantage and even stealing.

 

[Gnoekeos]

It most certainly is a thing and I'll tell you the story of how I learned that the hard way and could have lost my job if I hadn't been being completely honest about my concerns at the time. Years ago I had just been moved up to a team leader position in the factor where I worked, in the area I was in charge of we built fairly small parts that required some pretty nimble fingers and a back that doesn't hurt you from a little bit of discomfort. We had a LOT of employee turn over (people quitting) in this area, primarily because we would get a lot of temp workers (of various ages) who didn't want to work a demanding job and quit. In one month I had to train 5 different people on the same station because people kept quitting, one person didn't even last 45 minute. Aside from Temp workers not wanting a hard job the other thing I noticed was that a lot of the older ones who had otherwise hung in there were usually rubbing their hands or their back while wincing in pain before they quit. The other thing about our factory is that its huge and makes a variety of different product of many different sizes. When the plant received a new group of temp team members they basically distributed them at random through out the plant. My area was well known to be the hardest one in the plant as far as assembly goes but there are some areas where all the team member actually does is stand at the end of a conveyor belt and inspect the parts that come down it and put them in a box. Knowing that I made the mistake of asking about it in a public meeting. I don't remember what my exact words were at the time but the management who yelled at me afterward likened it to me having said "Can we stop hiring all these old people?" which wasn't what I wanted at all, I just didn't want to set them up for failure by putting them in my department when they might actually continue to work longer somewhere else. That explanation and the fact that one of the members of management acted like what I had said in the meeting was a joke right after I said it apparently saved me because they told me that I could have been fired for that because the older people could have taken it as me discriminating against them and sued the company. After wards I had to go around to all the departments in my section and appologize to everyone there for my "joke". Since then I've been working in the company for 5 years and thankfully all the people who kept giving me crap about that have quit or been fired.

 

[PhunkyPhazon]

Interesting. So from all of my scholar-oriented research, people over 40 claim young people discriminate against them. According to this thread and general survey results, young people claim they're discriminated against by the people over 40.

I'm curious to see where this is all going.

 

[Auron225]

The "demonizing of youth" - its the term used to talk about how society and the media will now refer to teenagers as hoodlums, etc. Its why you only need to shave your head, put on a tracksuit, wear a black hoody and walk around with a few friends that have done the same to make most people on the street avoid eye-contact and assume you'll stab them if they look at you funny.

EDIT: Just noticed its more the workplace you're interested about...

 

[Squidbulb]

Don't know anything about the workplace, but I hear young men have to pay a lot for car insurance nowadays.