Experienced and unemployed?

Youth unemployment has been with us for a while, but consider that even for "grown-up-adults" (who in many cases have tasted of the fruit of nicely-paid employment) the struggle is getting quite real  😎  No, really it's not funny.  😅

Ageism is a thing.  Trust California to take it to the extreme.  
“We Want People Who Have Their Best Work Ahead of Them, Not Behind Them.”  
Well, ok, that's just more business for this cosmetic surgeon: A few months ago, a 26-year-old came in seeking hair transplants to ward off his looming baldness. I told him I wouldn’t let him. His hair pattern isn’t even established...  Ok, that was funny.

2015 chart showing median employee age at leading US companies

Here are gripping battle-stories, mostly told by older workers and entrepreneurs.  They speak of the need to constantly upgrade skills, they speak of overwork, of workplace culture and sometimes faking the young-people behaviours to fit in, of the possibilities of exiting the race... I suppose many of them can become successful entrepreneurs? 

On the policy-level too, we should be thinking about how to apply all the abilities of all the people, and in particular, how to apply the accumulated wisdom of older workers, that is, how to 'turn grey into gold'. 


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Sources Linked // recommended reading:

• State of Youth Unemployment in Kenya (by Boaz Munga and Eldah Onsomu for Brookings Institution - Africa in Focus, August 2014)
• These Charts explain the current state of unemployment in Nigeria (in Ventures Africa, August 2016)
• The Brutal Ageism of Tech (in New Republic, March 2014) 
• The Stressful Lives of Older Tech Workers (in Business Insider, November 2015) 
• State of the Service 2011-2012, Chapter 05 Ageing and Work Ability (by Australian Public Service Commission, November 2012)