Photo: Alexey Danichev
Russian legislation did not recognize ageism as a form of discrimination until 2006, when amendments were passed to labor legislation prohibiting employers from setting unreasonable age limits. The five years that have passed since then have demonstrated that pure legislation is not enough to fight ageism. “We don’t have an effective mechanism to fight ageism,” said Vodyakov. “The employer can always refuse on the basis of the applicant’s qualities for enterprise and initiative and of course will not state their age as the reason for rejecting the applicant.”
Some working pensioners like Soshnikova deny facing any discrimination, claiming that the demand for quality professionals is so high that even age cannot discourage employers from opting for the more experienced workers.
“I don’t think pensioners have any trouble finding a job these days,” said Soshnikova. “Age can only be an issue when an older person tries to get a high-ranking job at a major corporation such as Gazprom or RAO UES, which try to hire younger people to take key positions whenever possible.”
Indeed, large companies are considered the leading perpetrators of ageism. “Large corporations such as Russian Railroads sign collective agreements with their employees, giving them additional benefits and pensions. They also set up their own private pension funds, which is positive,” said Vodyakov. “But at the same time, their HR people think that ‘we shouldn’t have any pensioners working for us.’ If they find elderly people working for one of their subsidiaries or in one of their divisions, they try to get rid of them. Of course, they don’t issue decrees terminating their employment, but instead advise older staff to consider the health risks of working and to ponder retirement.”
“This has to do exclusively with stereotypes; it all depends on the ethos and mentality of the manager,” director of the Zaschita Center Anna Golubkova said. “When we’re talking about large corporations, managers can’t control the entire company, so they often have to rely on their personnel department. If we’re talking about 30 to 35-year-olds working in human resources, they’ll often tell you that a 55-year-old is too old to work. When we’re dealing with stereotypes, it will probably take two to three generations before our mentality changes.”
Waiting for a change in mentality is one way to handle it, but people at the Center believe that they can bring about a change now by assisting those who found their rights violated just because of their age. The Zaschita Center, which is run by the Moscow government, provides free legal assistance to both employers and employees. This includes holding free consultations and goes as far as representing clients in court.
The right to work
Out of the 25,381 requests that were received last year, 651 were filed by working pensioners. According to Center Director Anna Golubkova, this category of applicants begins to file complaints only when they have either lost their jobs or are on the verge of losing them, while the discriminative treatment they have to endure goes much deeper than just refusals to hire. Finding employment is one thing, but having to cope with discrimination on a daily basis could be an even bigger challenge.
“Older workers are too afraid to lose their jobs,” said Golubkova. “Seldom will they complain about the problems they encounter while working.” Employers are well aware of this, and come up with different ways to take advantage of it.
“They often think that if a worker belongs to that age group and his dependence on this job is obvious, it is acceptable to pay him a lower salary, or to gives him inadequate working conditions,” said Golubkova. “We had a case when a woman who was fifty-six returned from vacation and got a new but very draughty working place, putting her at risk of catching a cold. They thought she was old so she wouldn’t really complain.”
The success rate for applicants of the center’s services is very high at over 80 percent, but reinstated workers are often pressurized into leaving their jobs anyway and usually do so just a few months after winning their cases. “Pensioners are the most vulnerable group of workers,” claimed Golubkova. According to her, the consequences of such discrimination hit the employers first.
“For 30-year-olds the choices are plenty; jobs are available in abundance,” said Golubkova. “When these stereotypes are in place, companies that are working for the government or in commerce hire young and attractive workers to help their company’s image, but then ask why their work isn’t getting done very well. Many of our 50 and 60-year-olds are far more competent and perform better than any young specialist you can find,” she added.
For people like Epelman, showing competence and efficiency in the workplace is not enough. “I like making people nice and elegant, I like putting them in a good mood and making sure they have a good time at the barber shop,” said Epelman, whose earnings also allow him to support his daughter and grandson. When asked if he ever plans on quitting, he said that it is not exactly up to him: “I’ll work for as long as my physical condition will allow, for as long as my hands don’t shake and my eyes can see.”
© Russia Profile.org 2008
August 4, 2008
RUSSIA: It is Common in Russia to Ignore Retirement Age, Continue Working
The Need to Be Needed
By Sergei Balashov
August 1, 2008
MOSCOW, Russia (Russia Profile), Edition of August 4, 2008:
Moscow-based barber Israel Epelman goes to work every morning five days a week, just as he has done for the past 50 years. Eleven years past official retirement age, he never thinks about quitting. Instead, Epelman, who used to have renowned KGB agent Pavel Sudoplatov and famous Soviet TV reporter Eduard Mnatsakanov as his customers, always looks forward to doing his job and meeting his clients, some of whom he has been serving for many years.
“I love my job; if I didn’t, I don’t think I’d be doing it for that long,” said Epelman. “This job is like a habit I have; life at home would be very boring.”
Epelman is just one of thousands of working pensioners in Russia, a phenomenon that has become widespread in a country where pensions are barely above the poverty threshold, which is three to four times lower than the average monthly income. If this doesn’t provide enough motivation for pensioners to keep working, the demand for them to stay in the workforce is also high. While in the industrial sector it has proved virtually impossible to find a young qualified worker since the state’s crisis in the vocational and technical school system in the 1990s, schools likewise often lack incentives to attract young teaching staff.
“Experienced, qualified specialists are always in high demand,” said Tamara Soshnikova, head of the civil and social rights department of the Moscow Humanitarian University. “Not that long ago, I saw a report about a 70-year-old worker who wasn’t let go by his employers. I’m experiencing the same. I get many job offers but people at my university want me to stay.”
Soshnikova, 64, is one of many elderly professors that uphold the Russian educational system where even private schools don’t have the financial means to bring in younger staff. “Over 100 graduates come from our department alone every year,” said Soshnikova. “Nobody wants to teach because the salaries aren’t very high. This year, we had 196 graduates and just one of them decided to continue postgraduate studies to stay as a professor. The situation has been like this for three years now.”
The exact figure of how many working pensioners there are in Russia is unknown as such statistics do not exist. According to the Federal State Statistics Service, by the end of 2007, 21.4 percent of Moscow workers were in the 50-59 age group, while 3.5 percent were 60 and over.
The aging burden
In large or small numbers, those in their advanced years can be found not just in schools or factories. Working far past the age limit, they often have to deal with challenges that are similar to those every other employee has to face, but in some ways unique to this group. Ageism is an old problem in Russia, where discrimination can be found even in advertisements for vacancies, where employers often set an unreasonable age limit for applicants.
“Discrimination does exist in Russia and cases of ageism are everywhere,” said Denis Vodyakov, deputy head of the consulting and legal expertise department of Moscow legal assistance centre Zaschita. “If you are trying to join the border patrol force it is very reasonable that you’d be required to be under thirty-five, but we often see that employers are looking for, say, lawyers that are younger than thirty. It is hard to tell what difference it makes if a lawyer is older than that.”
Photo: Alexey Danichev
Russian legislation did not recognize ageism as a form of discrimination until 2006, when amendments were passed to labor legislation prohibiting employers from setting unreasonable age limits. The five years that have passed since then have demonstrated that pure legislation is not enough to fight ageism. “We don’t have an effective mechanism to fight ageism,” said Vodyakov. “The employer can always refuse on the basis of the applicant’s qualities for enterprise and initiative and of course will not state their age as the reason for rejecting the applicant.”
Some working pensioners like Soshnikova deny facing any discrimination, claiming that the demand for quality professionals is so high that even age cannot discourage employers from opting for the more experienced workers.
“I don’t think pensioners have any trouble finding a job these days,” said Soshnikova. “Age can only be an issue when an older person tries to get a high-ranking job at a major corporation such as Gazprom or RAO UES, which try to hire younger people to take key positions whenever possible.”
Indeed, large companies are considered the leading perpetrators of ageism. “Large corporations such as Russian Railroads sign collective agreements with their employees, giving them additional benefits and pensions. They also set up their own private pension funds, which is positive,” said Vodyakov. “But at the same time, their HR people think that ‘we shouldn’t have any pensioners working for us.’ If they find elderly people working for one of their subsidiaries or in one of their divisions, they try to get rid of them. Of course, they don’t issue decrees terminating their employment, but instead advise older staff to consider the health risks of working and to ponder retirement.”
“This has to do exclusively with stereotypes; it all depends on the ethos and mentality of the manager,” director of the Zaschita Center Anna Golubkova said. “When we’re talking about large corporations, managers can’t control the entire company, so they often have to rely on their personnel department. If we’re talking about 30 to 35-year-olds working in human resources, they’ll often tell you that a 55-year-old is too old to work. When we’re dealing with stereotypes, it will probably take two to three generations before our mentality changes.”
Waiting for a change in mentality is one way to handle it, but people at the Center believe that they can bring about a change now by assisting those who found their rights violated just because of their age. The Zaschita Center, which is run by the Moscow government, provides free legal assistance to both employers and employees. This includes holding free consultations and goes as far as representing clients in court.
The right to work
Out of the 25,381 requests that were received last year, 651 were filed by working pensioners. According to Center Director Anna Golubkova, this category of applicants begins to file complaints only when they have either lost their jobs or are on the verge of losing them, while the discriminative treatment they have to endure goes much deeper than just refusals to hire. Finding employment is one thing, but having to cope with discrimination on a daily basis could be an even bigger challenge.
“Older workers are too afraid to lose their jobs,” said Golubkova. “Seldom will they complain about the problems they encounter while working.” Employers are well aware of this, and come up with different ways to take advantage of it.
“They often think that if a worker belongs to that age group and his dependence on this job is obvious, it is acceptable to pay him a lower salary, or to gives him inadequate working conditions,” said Golubkova. “We had a case when a woman who was fifty-six returned from vacation and got a new but very draughty working place, putting her at risk of catching a cold. They thought she was old so she wouldn’t really complain.”
The success rate for applicants of the center’s services is very high at over 80 percent, but reinstated workers are often pressurized into leaving their jobs anyway and usually do so just a few months after winning their cases. “Pensioners are the most vulnerable group of workers,” claimed Golubkova. According to her, the consequences of such discrimination hit the employers first.
“For 30-year-olds the choices are plenty; jobs are available in abundance,” said Golubkova. “When these stereotypes are in place, companies that are working for the government or in commerce hire young and attractive workers to help their company’s image, but then ask why their work isn’t getting done very well. Many of our 50 and 60-year-olds are far more competent and perform better than any young specialist you can find,” she added.
For people like Epelman, showing competence and efficiency in the workplace is not enough. “I like making people nice and elegant, I like putting them in a good mood and making sure they have a good time at the barber shop,” said Epelman, whose earnings also allow him to support his daughter and grandson. When asked if he ever plans on quitting, he said that it is not exactly up to him: “I’ll work for as long as my physical condition will allow, for as long as my hands don’t shake and my eyes can see.”
© Russia Profile.org 2008
Photo: Alexey Danichev
Russian legislation did not recognize ageism as a form of discrimination until 2006, when amendments were passed to labor legislation prohibiting employers from setting unreasonable age limits. The five years that have passed since then have demonstrated that pure legislation is not enough to fight ageism. “We don’t have an effective mechanism to fight ageism,” said Vodyakov. “The employer can always refuse on the basis of the applicant’s qualities for enterprise and initiative and of course will not state their age as the reason for rejecting the applicant.”
Some working pensioners like Soshnikova deny facing any discrimination, claiming that the demand for quality professionals is so high that even age cannot discourage employers from opting for the more experienced workers.
“I don’t think pensioners have any trouble finding a job these days,” said Soshnikova. “Age can only be an issue when an older person tries to get a high-ranking job at a major corporation such as Gazprom or RAO UES, which try to hire younger people to take key positions whenever possible.”
Indeed, large companies are considered the leading perpetrators of ageism. “Large corporations such as Russian Railroads sign collective agreements with their employees, giving them additional benefits and pensions. They also set up their own private pension funds, which is positive,” said Vodyakov. “But at the same time, their HR people think that ‘we shouldn’t have any pensioners working for us.’ If they find elderly people working for one of their subsidiaries or in one of their divisions, they try to get rid of them. Of course, they don’t issue decrees terminating their employment, but instead advise older staff to consider the health risks of working and to ponder retirement.”
“This has to do exclusively with stereotypes; it all depends on the ethos and mentality of the manager,” director of the Zaschita Center Anna Golubkova said. “When we’re talking about large corporations, managers can’t control the entire company, so they often have to rely on their personnel department. If we’re talking about 30 to 35-year-olds working in human resources, they’ll often tell you that a 55-year-old is too old to work. When we’re dealing with stereotypes, it will probably take two to three generations before our mentality changes.”
Waiting for a change in mentality is one way to handle it, but people at the Center believe that they can bring about a change now by assisting those who found their rights violated just because of their age. The Zaschita Center, which is run by the Moscow government, provides free legal assistance to both employers and employees. This includes holding free consultations and goes as far as representing clients in court.
The right to work
Out of the 25,381 requests that were received last year, 651 were filed by working pensioners. According to Center Director Anna Golubkova, this category of applicants begins to file complaints only when they have either lost their jobs or are on the verge of losing them, while the discriminative treatment they have to endure goes much deeper than just refusals to hire. Finding employment is one thing, but having to cope with discrimination on a daily basis could be an even bigger challenge.
“Older workers are too afraid to lose their jobs,” said Golubkova. “Seldom will they complain about the problems they encounter while working.” Employers are well aware of this, and come up with different ways to take advantage of it.
“They often think that if a worker belongs to that age group and his dependence on this job is obvious, it is acceptable to pay him a lower salary, or to gives him inadequate working conditions,” said Golubkova. “We had a case when a woman who was fifty-six returned from vacation and got a new but very draughty working place, putting her at risk of catching a cold. They thought she was old so she wouldn’t really complain.”
The success rate for applicants of the center’s services is very high at over 80 percent, but reinstated workers are often pressurized into leaving their jobs anyway and usually do so just a few months after winning their cases. “Pensioners are the most vulnerable group of workers,” claimed Golubkova. According to her, the consequences of such discrimination hit the employers first.
“For 30-year-olds the choices are plenty; jobs are available in abundance,” said Golubkova. “When these stereotypes are in place, companies that are working for the government or in commerce hire young and attractive workers to help their company’s image, but then ask why their work isn’t getting done very well. Many of our 50 and 60-year-olds are far more competent and perform better than any young specialist you can find,” she added.
For people like Epelman, showing competence and efficiency in the workplace is not enough. “I like making people nice and elegant, I like putting them in a good mood and making sure they have a good time at the barber shop,” said Epelman, whose earnings also allow him to support his daughter and grandson. When asked if he ever plans on quitting, he said that it is not exactly up to him: “I’ll work for as long as my physical condition will allow, for as long as my hands don’t shake and my eyes can see.”
© Russia Profile.org 2008
