After hearing oral arguments on October 7, the Supreme Court left in place an appeals court decision that the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) doesn’t apply to job applicants alleging a company’s hiring policies adversely impact older adults. The implications:
- It will be more difficult for older job applicants to prove they’ve been discriminated against based on age.
- The ADEA protects employees (not applicants) age 40 and older from age discrimination. It prohibits employers from making statements that suggest efforts to discriminate based on age.
- The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals decided that requesting an external job applicant have no more than a certain number of years of experience isn’t age discrimination.
- Employers still can’t make job ads on social media visible only to users below a certain age; and they can’t mandate that applicants be “digital natives.”
