Nearly one in four American workers over 50 say they feel pushed out of their jobs. Two out of three have seen or experienced age discrimination at work. These figures come from AARP’s newest 2026 survey, and here is the part that angers me: they have barely moved in two years.

This fall, unemployed workers aged 55 to 64 had been searching for an average of more than eight months.

I know these numbers from both sides of the desk.

For 20 years I was a headhunter in New York City, filling jobs for major corporations. I heard what clients said about older candidates behind closed doors.

“We are not a rest home.”

“This is not geriatrics.”

“We’re not even sure this person will get here on Monday morning, or on time. They’ll need to leave on Saturday to arrive on Monday.”

Awful. Sheer contempt. And illegal. Age discrimination has been against federal law since 1967. It still happens every day.

At 58, I lost my job. Suddenly I was the candidate, sending résumés into silence and wondering if the world had decided I was done. One recruiter encouraged me to enjoy retirement.

Candidate. Applicant. Try human being: a real person with feelings, hopes, and fears.

That is the human cost the statistics don’t show. Ageism doesn’t only close doors. It gets inside you. You stop applying for the job you could do in your sleep. You tell yourself you’re too old to learn. That is the quietest discrimination of all, the kind we do to ourselves.

I refused. I was not ready to fade. I had more to give. I chose to reinvent myself on my own terms. With help from friends, I went back to school and became a coach at 58. At 60, I opened a real estate business on a Caribbean island. At 70, I was hired by a respected global company to coach people around the world. They saw my experience as an asset, not a risk. At 74, I published my first book. And I am still reinventing.

None of it required me to be young. It only required what I already had: Years of expert experience, a headhunter’s listening, a professional actor’s skills, and decades of reading people and solving problems.

Your skills are not stuck in your last job title. They travel with you. Always relevent. Always valuable.

If you are over 50 and feel pushed aside, try this today: write down 10 things you know how to do. Not titles. Skills. Calming an angry client. Training the new hire. Seeing possibilities in people. Fixing what nobody else could. Then ask where else that list belongs.

Employers, stop asking for graduation dates. Stop screening out “overqualified.” Judge the work, not the birth year. The people you dismiss tend to stay longer, mentor generously, and show up. On Monday. On time. Their life experience and empathy are worth every dollar.

The numbers say we are finished at a certain age. I say the numbers are wrong.

All your skills are transferable. And you are not finished yet.

Thanks – Michael (he, him)

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This matters too – Sagerism – The New Philosophy of Ageing.

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