Age Discrimination:
Effects of Education and Gender

Aims

To understand how age discrimination at work is experienced by people over 50 and how this experience differs by gender and previous educational experience.
To understand the broader factors that affect older workers ability and desire to continue working.
To find out the kinds of change to the organisation of work which might make working longer more attractive, and how far these might be feasible for, or attractive to, employers.

A report detailing:

Older peoples' perceptions of age discrimination and the barriers encountered when seeking to enter, or maintain their employability within, the labour market.
The views of differing groups of older people on how paid employment might be made more attractive to people over 50.
Advice on ways in which employers can practically reduce age discrimination and make better use of older people.

The project was in four phases:

a literature review to map what is already known about the relationship between gender, qualification and labour market engagement in later life
39 semi-structured qualitative interviews with a sample of working men and women aged between 50-69 drawn from the sample identified through the omnibus survey. Interviewees were in a variety of kinds of employment and sector and had a wide range of educational qualifications. The aims of this phase are: 1) to establish the influence that a person's biography has on their experience of age discrimination, and 2) to discover what working practices they think would make work more accessible and attractive.
focus groups with employers to discuss the ideas raised in the interviews and develop a survey instrument
an online survey of employers to investigate how far they would consider the kinds of change proposed in the qualitative interviews.

The findings of both phases of the research are to be combined into a report for publication in Autumn 2006.

September 2003 to August 2006

HE ESF

Lynda Owen
E-mail: l.owen@surrey.ac.uk