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Dozens of Companies Are Using Facebook to Exclude Older Workers From Job Ads

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Re: Dozens of Companies Are Using Facebook to Exclude Older Workers From Job Ads

#751

Post by yourapostasy »

nickthemagicman wrote: post #285
yourapostasy wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the highly distorted US employment market, older employees are more expensive even at the same salary level as younger employees. Big factor I haven’t seen discussed in these comment threads yet is healthcare expenses. In average aggregates, older employees in the US will tend to consume more and more expensive healthcare services, products, and pharmaceuticals. Unless you are an outlier, and somehow signal lots o…

1099..problem solved

You should clarify what part of the problem is solved.

Under individual 1099 wage treatment in the US, the healthcare cost shift is generally not in favor of the employees in older cohorts. If you are claiming to use actual individual freelance-style contributors engaging with clients as 1099, then you should look at the pricing and coverage constraints of individual healthcare plans in the US for older employees.

1099 corp-to-corp is done all the time of course, but that simply shuffles around the pieces on the board. The cost only appears to get magicked away in most 1099-oriented arrangements because the vast majority of 1099 individuals I've worked alongside and gotten to know have compromised pretty extensively on their benefit plans, compared to most conventional big group-based benefit plans. In the US, volume discounts don't cover just price, but all sorts of other transaction factors that simply do not show up in economic statistics.

There are some individuals out there who are comfortable doing 1099 work, while meeting or exceeding benefits plans of big groups, and I've done it myself in the past. It takes a lot of discernment, judgement, and work to navigate the thicket of options and constantly-changing regulatory landscape from many different jurisdictions. It's easy to wave the magic wand of the free market and say make everyone a free agent, but in reality it's not for everyone, and I would not promote it as a general policy for the general population. Ronald Coase's work on the economic effects of transaction costs at individual and firm level illuminates some rationales behind why encouraging individual 1099 transactions would not produce optimal results.

Re: Dozens of Companies Are Using Facebook to Exclude Older Workers From Job Ads

#752

Post by scarface74 »

candiodari wrote: post #739
scarface74 wrote: post #583

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why I added (questionable). I've made the mistake at one company of thinking that my job was to architect solid software that was sustainable for the long term. What they really wanted was to have software that was "good enough" and had all of the checkbox features to be attractive to potential acquirers so the investors would stop breathing down their necks.

Twitter "made 2.5B losses". Yeah ... that's bad ... but not from the perspectives of investors. Jack Dorsey became a billionaire from those losses. The same is true for probably all other early investors. For an investment in Twitter to have done really badly, there was a "bear" period of about 2 years. And before you say it, remember that even Google stock dropped 60%, Facebook's 70%. Twitter's drop actually looks p…

A business model is by definition "bad" if it doesn't make sustainable profits. Of course you have to allow for time, but Twitter isn't a startup.

Re: Dozens of Companies Are Using Facebook to Exclude Older Workers From Job Ads

#753

Post by matt4077 »

lmm wrote: post #546
tmh79 wrote: post #29

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?

An ad space that will be shown to people in a specific age range isn't and shouldn't be illegal. A few specific classes of ads (e.g. for jobs or housing) are illegal to run in such an ad space, but I would expect the vast majority of ads are legal to run in such an ad space. As such I'd take the view that what Facebook is selling is legal, and if someone is running an ad that is regulated to a higher standard than no…

These ads were explicitly submitted as job ads, per the article.

Re: Dozens of Companies Are Using Facebook to Exclude Older Workers From Job Ads

#755

Post by brepl »

user5994461 wrote: post #654
coding123 wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience that kind of pay differential exists in two places: Pakistan - US or Intern - Not intern. All other roles for different ages I've ever seen has been based on experience and not age, and at the companies I've been that experience is only about 30-50% higher at the worst.

At most companies I've seen, in a single team, two people doing the same thing with a similar amount of experience can have a difference of pay of double.

Why is this getting downvoted?

Re: Dozens of Companies Are Using Facebook to Exclude Older Workers From Job Ads

#757

Post by zbentley »

emodendroket wrote: post #246
lorenzq wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that older Unix or C++ programmer doesn't have a strong bias against Javascript, functional programming, new es6/es7 concepts, and web appliactions in general, then sure. I see many of these types of people even on HN with biases though. Age shouldn't be used as a catch all filter, but I can see how it might be faster to screen those who have been too content to stick to their tools without catching up to industry…

People who are early in their careers can be quite dogmatic too.

I think graphing dogmatism over age is an inverse bell curve on average, with a lot of point variation.

Re: Dozens of Companies Are Using Facebook to Exclude Older Workers From Job Ads

#758

Post by OliverJones »

100 years ago the letters "NINA" were often included in newspaper help-wanted ads in the USA. Those letters mean "no Irish need apply."

Now FB has figured out a better way to handle help-wanted ad market segmentation.

They've also, basically, guaranteed that they will be regulated to bring their business practices in line with legal norms in the countries where they accept payment.

Re: Dozens of Companies Are Using Facebook to Exclude Older Workers From Job Ads

#759

Post by talmand »

lmm wrote: post #542
nhebb wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone in their 50's, that argument makes no sense to me. If I were unable to find a job, you somehow think I'd hold out for premium wages?

Many people in their '50s do; a lot of people are anchored to their previous salary level and would never accept what they see as a "pay cut". And a company doesn't want to hire someone at a "below market" rate, for fear that they'd jump ship as soon as possible.

To quote Weird Al Yankovic responding to being overqualified while looking for work before his singing career, "Yeah, but I gotta eat!"

Re: Dozens of Companies Are Using Facebook to Exclude Older Workers From Job Ads

#760

Post by talmand »

Balgair wrote: post #663
user5994461 wrote: post #656

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in a first world nation. College education is free, allegedly. If you have kids before your thirties, they will all be +25 when you are 55. They most likely finished college, they probably left the family home.

In the US college is NOT free, and that's 330 million people living here.

Don't worry, it's just someone that has no idea of what they speak of pretending they know how to tell other people in a completely different context on how their lives should have turned out.
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