“TURNED ADRIFT”

Greymouth Evening Star, 22 March 1935, Page 10

“TURNED ADRIFT”

TOO OLD AT FORTY-FIVE. Attention is directed by the Meicantile Gazette” to what it describes as “one of the most pathetic features of the depression." This is the dismissal —“turned adrift,” the journal describes it—of men engaged in commercial pursuits who have reached the age of 45 to 50.. "The trouble is that so very often a man is thoroughly experienced, and could do his job, but having lost one place where perhaps he was engaged for a number of years, his age is now a barrier against his even securing an interview for another position, states the “Gazette.” "It is not that the middle-aged man insists on a higher wage or more privileges than his juniors—men who formerly occupied important positions would only be too pleased to work today us junior clerks —but unfortunately’such jobs are not available to them," the “Gazette” remarks. "The employer not infrequently feels uncomfortable at the idea of: having to pay an older man a junior wage. Apart from other considerations, the rest of the employees would not like it; they possibly would feel uncomfortable also. The result is that the trained man of 45 who is willing to start at the bottom is even in less demand than one of the same age who expects a place near the top. "During the last few years," the journal continues, “employers have been told so often to give youth a chance that there is a tendency to adopt the policy of ‘too old at fortyfive,’ witii the result that those whose careers have been interrupted by the depression find themselves unwanted at what should still be the high-water mark of their business or professional lives.

"It is a fallacy to suppose that the middle-aged man is any less virile than his junior. . . It seems odd that.a community, which has amongst its foremost business mon and leaders of its professional and political life men for the most part of over sixty years of age, should believe that the ordinary business man’s brain is tired at forty and useless at fortyfive. . . Even in the comparatively short life of this Dominion most of our progressive thought and action has been initiated by men in the prime of life.” WHAT IS THE REMEDY? The "Gazette” recognises the difficulty of prescribing remedies for the problem above referred to, but it holds that, "it is timely that the business community generally should give some little attention to this matter of the unwanted men in our midst. The trouble too often is that the morale of these people is breaking under the strain, and unless some effort is made to assist them we shall gradually build up a class of hopeless and depressed individuals who will eventually not only become a burden on the community, but may by reason of their desperate position create an atmosphere which is inimical to the public good.” The suggestion is then made that employers generally might be a little more tolerant when it comes to the question of engaging staff, and in cases where the services of an older man are offering they might reasonably give some of these unfortunate people a chance. Junior members of

an establishment should be shown that it is only reasonable that some of the older men who have been out of employment for some time should receive special consideration now that business conditions are becoming a little more normal. ,