March 4, 1998
Elderly struggle to land jobs in Golden Years
By Garret Leiva
Herald staff writer
For the past two months Ruth Fralowicz has struggled to find a job. She has gone to employment agencies, she has answered help-wanted ads. She has filed out application forms and given job interviews. But in the end the answer is always the same: thanks, but no thanks.
It is an answer the Traverse City resident cannot understand. After all, she has years of work experience, decades' worth of job skills and more than a half-century of life experiences. But perhaps that is the problem; she has too much life experience.
"It's nothing overt enough to prove, but I definitely feel like I'm being discriminated against because of my age," said Fralowicz, who asked that her actual age not be disclosed but instead be identified as "55 plus."
At an age when most people are looking forward to the Golden Years, Fralowicz sees retirement being forced upon her. While Social Security would provide a monthly income, the reality is retirement will never remain an option when it comes to paying the bills. "I'll probably have to work the rest of my life," said Fralowicz, who has worked as a bookkeeper, switchboard operator and payroll clerk.
Her situation is not unique. Many mature workers are out pounding the pavement and answering want ads. They still need to work, and they are finding that landing a job now is perhaps tougher than ever.
Sue Graybill of the Area Agency on Aging of Northwest Michigan sees workers re-enter the work force for a multitude of reasons. Some work out of boredom and the need to feel "a purpose for getting up in the morning," she said. For others, earning an income comes down to survival, to dollars and cents.
"Many clients find Social Security cannot provide enough money to live on while making monthly expenditures such as keeping the car running or even paying a house mortgage," said Graybill, coordinator of senior employment programs at the Traverse City-based private nonprofit agency.
Living month to month was how Victor Lucien existed. The Lake Ann resident, who had move from the Detroit area to the Grand Traverse region two years ago, found his veteran's pension could not support a semi-retired lifestyle. "It was just enough to pay the rent and other expenses. I could barely see the end of the month," he said.
So the former maintenance man did what only seemed natural - he started looking for work. He combed the Sunday classifieds. He made the circuit, filing out applications and sitting down for job interviews. But the offers were few and far between, most of them only part-time or limited hours.
"You get a little gray and they're just not interested," said the 56-year-old. "And that's a tragedy because that happens to a lot of people who spend their life in an occupation and this age things gets attached to them and they're out of a job."
While the Equal Opportunity Employment Act requires that mature workers receive a fair shake, Graybill said misconceptions and stigmas still hang over the hiring process. Issues such as trainability, absenteeism and lack of motivation are some of the hurdles seniors have to clear to enter the work field.
This despite statistics from a five-year nationwide study by the philanthropic Commonwealth Fund of New York that show more than 14 million older Americans are employed and consistently receive high ratings on job skills, loyalty, reliability, absenteeism and lack of turnover.
Locally, services such as the Area Agency on Aging are trying to bring those numbers to light by providing older workers a more level playing field in the job market. Clients of the Area Agency on Aging receive job training and they work on interview skills and update computer skills. The agency even will make haircut appointments and provide clothes for job interviews.
Despite these efforts, some workers like Ruth Fralowicz continue to search, working temporary jobs as a means to get by.
Others, though, have found not only full-time employment but something more valuable than a paycheck.
"It's more than a job; it's allowed me to regain my self-esteem and self-worth," said Lucien of his new job as a maintenance worker at a local resort.