Will You Spend Your Golden Years Under the Golden Arches?

Grocery store baggers, gas station attendants, store clerks and latte servers – service jobs like these don’t pay well, but in a stagnant economy, an unexpected contest is now brewing between two generations vying for the few jobs that remain available.

Typically, service sector jobs attract young applicants in their teens and twenties, but after watching their retirement savings dry up, many retirees are headed back to work, competing with Gen-Xers for whatever entry-level jobs they can find.

Nowhere is this more evident, the New York Times reports, than in Fort Lauderdale. And it’s said the retirees are winning out because employers prefer what they perceive as greater reliability and experience over youth. Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics back that up, showing rising employment in the age-65-and-older category and falling employment in the age-16-to-24-year-old category. Still, seniors claim age discrimination is alive and well. If you thought job-hunting at age 50 was tough, imagine what it’d be like if you were 70.

Would you be prepared to do what it takes, whether that means working at a fast-food restaurant or cleaning motel rooms, if you lost your current job?

Tags: effects of recession, retirees back to work, retirees working

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