Age discrimination in Finnish working life

In work-life, the age discrimination of over 50 year old administrative and clerical employees (in Finnish toimihenkilö) is more common than is generally thought. This is revealed in a study that the Trade Union Pro, which is the union that represents employed workers in Finland. The study was done in 2011.

According to the study, over 55 year old unemployed respondents thought their possibilities to get a new job were poor. Only 6 % of the same age group believed they had a good possibility to get a new job.

In order to succeed in the competition of the employment markets, mature employees need to update their knowhow with supplementary courses. In many cases this possibility is taken away from them, because employers do not want to provide further training for older employees. The study shows that employees over 50 years old are having very little or no possibilities for supplementary courses.

It is not that these employees would not like to have further training: Four out of ten unemployed respondents over 55 years old felt they need to update their knowhow in order to succeed among younger coworkers. Every second person of the same age group has not had any supplementary courses in their working place. This proves that the companies do not see benefits on training mature employees: it is seen more important to educate younger personnel than mature.

Lack of further training

This lack of further training causes problems for mature employees (in Finnish palkansaaja) cumulatively when layoffs are being made. If there has not been the possibility to keep up with development in the specific area of industry, the possibility to get laid off is naturally bigger.

On top of that, the Finnish legal system supports layoffs for more mature employees. When employee over 57 year old is given notice, they are allowed to have earnings-related unemployment allowance until the age of retirement. In Finnish this is called “eläkeputki”, translated roughly as “retirement funnel”.

The study proves that even though the mature administrative and clerical employees would like to continue their working career, they are being laid off since they have the possibility to get into the retirement funnel. As the younger employees do not have similar options, it is often seen fairer by employers to lay off mature ones. The main idea behind this attitude is to lessen the losses of all parties, but this definitely puts more mature employees in an unfair position during layoffs.

All in all, employees over 50 years old don’t have the same opportunities and possibilities in the work-life as younger employees have. The discussion of postponing the age of retirement is ridiculous, if it is compared to the study: how could any career path be longer, if employers do not have the will to make it longer?