Age discrimination does take place, and for anybody who’s been subject to discrimination I feel that they do have a right to feel hacked off. As we all go through life we are all discriminated against, be it on age, sex, religion, race, personality, looks, or even intelligence. It made me laugh that a little while back tat a shop wanted to place an advertisement in a job centre for somebody with a pleasant personality. The job centre said you can’t do that as it discriminates against people who don’t have a pleasant personality!
The airlines do take age into account and I agree that maybe younger candidates are a lower training risk. However there are crap younger candidates as well as crap older guys. But to rule out older candidates before ability has been assessed is in my opinion wrong and very short sighted.
Myself, I’ve got an ATPL with over 750 hours multi-crew turbine time and first time passes in both the GFT and I/R. Yet can I get an interview?
One airline I recently applied to asked for a minimum of 1000 hours turbine time. Needless to say they didn’t offer me an interview, using this as the reason. However I know for a fact that they were interviewing candidates with far less experience than myself. Maybe it was my training background, my lack of hair or my age. I don’t know and I’m past caring. The lesson here is that airlines can easily get around age discrimination. By setting certain criteria such as minimum hours, then using this are a reason for rejecting people, but at the same time taking on people without the hours.
Happy days indeed
P.S. Yes I am a self-confessed grumpy old man. It gives me a great amount of pleasure and I wouldn't change even if I could
