We know that the population is aging.  This is reflected in the workforce, and in the increasing  number of charges are age bias.

In discussing “The Normal Heart,” HBO’s adaptation of Larry Kramer’s 1985 play about the early days of the AIDS crisis in New York,  Gina Bellafante in the New York Times says that our society has a distorted views on aging: “We have changed from a society that expressed its ageism rather explicitly to one that masks its bias by celebrating those who age in ways that seem to defy physical reality.”

She says that “the public health movements that have gained the most momentum have been those that have sought to abate what can only be classified as tragedy — death visited too early.”    And that this excludes the tragedy of Alzheimer’s, which has just replaced AIDS on the NYC list of the top ten leading causes of death in New York.

She notes that Alzheimer’s “damage is sure to multiply as the number of older New Yorkers increases — by 2030 there will be close to 500,000 more people over age 60 than there were at the beginning of the century.”

Although not an article about employment discrimination, nonetheless it raised our awareness about aging in America.