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The way to get it done legally would be to group the ads for different age groups and have them either all shown/approved or none at all.
Is this different than advertising in a magazine that has a specific reader demographic? Or would that get a company in trouble too, if a the court rules that the intent was to exclude a given group?
Intent matters, and judges and juries, while not perfect, do a reasonable job of assessing it. One factor that usually works in the favour of justice is that lawsuits usually target the companies, and there are always at least some employees who do the calculation and decide not to perjure themselves for the financial benefit of their employer.
Those companies pay per impression, so they want to maximize the effect of the ad, and reach as many candidates as possible per each $ they pay FB.
This is just an ad. No one can stop you from applying to a job directly with the company, irregardless of your age, or any other demographics.
Just another sensational headline.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What would happen in the physical world with, say, a classified ad in a newspaper? It's on the poster of the ad to follow the law, not the paper, is it not?
In your example, what do you think would happen if someone posted an ad selling drugs?
With that example in mind, that puts someone running the ad in a weird place, since literally every ad network in 2017 does demographic targeting.
I don't think it's feasible to vet every ad that runs to ensure that the poster is complying with the law.
All that being said, this smells like Facebook, much like any other popular virtual public square, hiding behind the "We're an open platform!" defense when convenient to avoid legal action, and hiding behind the "We're a private company!" defense when convenient to disclaim accusations of poor or inconsistent moderation. They should not get to have it both ways. Either they exercise editorial control and can be liable for what their users post, or they can keep their hands off and push that liability back to the poster.
Rant aside, I'm more interested in the general case of demographic targeting when it comes to certain ads.
Is this different than advertising in a magazine that has a specific reader demographic? Or would that get a company in trouble too, if a the court rules that the intent was to exclude a given group?
It's against U.S. federal law for employers to discriminate against people aged 40-or-over on the basis of age. Having job ads that only younger people could see would seemingly fall afoul of that law: https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/statutes/adea.cfm
I have heard that companies like recent grads because they are (1) more malleable and (2) can be paid less. But neither of those reasons seem to me strong enough. I'm talking completely about the company's own interests.
Let's address the first reason: malleability. A recent grad presumably will adopt the company's culture faster, complain less, and in general pick up things sooner. Well, the hardest, meanest coworkers I've ever had were late twenties, early thirties. I've worked with people in their sixties, and they're sweet people. Even the grumpy old sysadmin had only a thin layer of spikes. After just a few days I could see through most of it, and he was 10 times more helpful than my other sysadmins. Not only was he softer (at least deep down) but he was smarter, having done it for decades. Even when he met a new problem, his keenly developed taste made him more likely to choose something that would be more maintainable long term.
Now let's address the second reason: salary. I am 10 times better than I was when I started. I know, because I still work with some of my code from back then, and I desperately want to rewrite it all. How much more does a senior developer make than a new hire? 50% more? Seems worth it to me. 100% more? 200% more? Still maybe worth it. And if some old fella can't get work at all, maybe he would settle for something between 50% and 100% more. I mean, why not at least make an offer?
It just don't make no sense. Other fields reward grayhairs. You see some sixty-year-old painter or architect or carpenter, you think he's probably pretty good. You see some straight-out-of-college twenty-something in . . . any other field, you think, "I sure hope he knows what he's doing."
She emphasized that she was looking for diversity, because, as she said, "the type of people on the other side of the table from us are different than they used to be, and they don't want to be dealing with a bunch of 65-year-old white guys. So those aren't the type of people we're looking for." That's pretty much a direct quote.
I was at a small company before I went to grad school. The company began working with a guy in his sixties who'd been laid off for a while and couldn't find work, even though he had a ton of experience. We brought him in on a contract basis, and his role gradually expanded as it became clear that he had both excellent technical knowledge and great people skills. He became a mentor to me and helped me out a ton. He's objectively better at our profession than I am in multiple dimensions, but right now I could find a new job ten times more easily than he could.
I'd like to start a business in 3 or 4 years, and I'm seriously considering going out of my way to target people like him. It'll be my competitive advantage.
Laugh while you can monkey boys. That generation built the infrastructure you rely on daily. Way to pay it forward. Suddenly, they too will turn around and realize that they're above 40 and not in the preferred demo. It all comes around in the end. Sometimes the SDN boys need a salty old dog to ask if anyone has actually looked at the back of GigE interface to see if theres a cable actually plugged into it :)
While at a certain level I can't help but agree with you, I think some self-reflection is in order. It is perfectly legal to discriminate against young people but not against older folks. Those laws were put into place by that generation you reference. Not to mention that the likely reason to target younger employees is because they can be paid less for the same job. That is a manifestation of the ongoing depowering…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Facebook is selling advertising. In this specific case, the product they are selling is illegal. Facebook should be held liable for selling illegal advertising. Do people find this challenging? Is there something wrong with this?
What would happen in the physical world with, say, a classified ad in a newspaper? It's on the poster of the ad to follow the law, not the paper, is it not?
I think that is perfectly legal, ethical and acceptable. Those companies pay per impression, so they want to maximize the effect of the ad, and reach as many candidates as possible per each $ they pay FB. This is just an ad. No one can stop you from applying to a job directly with the company, irregardless of your age, or any other demographics. Just another sensational headline.
https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/practices/
Recruitment
It is also illegal for an employer to recruit new employees in a way that discriminates against them because of their race, color, religion, sex (including gender identity, sexual orientation, and pregnancy), national origin, age (40 or older), disability or genetic information.
For example, an employer's reliance on word-of-mouth recruitment by its mostly Hispanic work force may violate the law if the result is that almost all new hires are Hispanic.