As the Workforce Ages, Lawmakers Revisit Age Discrimination

Bipartisan lawmakers in Connecticut are supporting a measure that targets age discrimination by barring employers from requiring prospective hires to list their age, birth date, or graduation year on applications, reports the CT Mirror . "It closes a very costly loophole that exists right now for older workers, because . . . employers in a job interview cannot ask the job applicant their age," said Sen. Derek Slap (D-Conn.). The bill is the latest legislative attempt to prohibit employers from using screening questions on applications. The 55-and-older employee segment has grown by a factor of two since 2000, and the AARP estimates that although about 10,000 baby boomers reach retirement age every day, only 5,900 will retire then. Slap said this trend is particularly profound in Connecticut, which has the sixth-oldest workforce in the United States. AARP Connecticut Director Nora Duncan said 35 percent of the U.S. workforce will be older than 50 by 2022, and the two fastest-growing workforce populations are those 65 to 74 and 75-plus. "They are also the folks who are telling us their experience in age discrimination," she noted.