Dissertation_Paula Aleksandrowicz_12 ... - Jacobs University

Difficulties with recruitment of qualified staff was seen as the most pressing personnel
problem in two German firm surveys conducted in 2000 (Buck et al. 2002: 37, 39;
Schneider/Stein 2006: 6). One third of companies surveyed by the IZA institute (ibid)
reported problems with filling executive positions, but the recruitment of older workers or
prolonged employment of older managers is not regarded as a viable alternative). The IAB
Establishment Panel of 2002 revealed that half of German firms would hire older workers
without any conditions, and one third of them would hire older workers if a subsidy was
paid by the employment office (Brussig 2005: 12). The factual hiring behaviour is more
gloomy – the minority of German firms hired one or more workers 50+ in the year 2004
(Bellmann 2005) – for the most part due to a lack of job applications of older persons, but
also due to missing competences or a general bias towards older workers.
In Poland, already three fourths of private employers perceive problems with finding
new staff, in which case more than half of them is willing to hire older workers (Ipsos 2007:
10-12), but the majority of employers would hire a younger worker given equal
qualifications and equal wage demands (Tokarz 2007a: 11). However, the mass migration of
young Poles to Western Europe creates an opportunity for older job-seekers, especially in
building and construction. Among Polish firms which recruited workers in 2007, the
majority hired also workers aged 50 years and more (Ipsos 2007: 9). Job applications from
´50pluses´ were reported more often than in the German survey. However, most Polish
employers do not know the institutional incentives and subsidies for hiring older workers
(ibid: 7).
Reasons for the hesitant recruitment of elderly applicants are inter al. their assumed
lower capabilities and their assumed higher wage expectations as transported by neoclassical
labour market theories. Older workers on-the job (´insiders´) are assessed in
preferential terms, whereas the approach to older job-seekers (´outsiders´) is biased
(Köchling/Deimel 2006: 127-8; Koller/Gruber 2001: 492-3, 500; Ipsos 2007).
Establishments which have experience with older workers assess them in more positive
terms (Brussig 2005: 13; Bellmann et al. 2003: 144-5; Ipsos 2007: 29). The catch-22 is that
the most frequent measure applied by firms with older workforce in Germany is early
retirement, resulting in their massive exodus at the age of 55-60 years. Therefore, firms have
little or no experience with workers at the age of 60 and more and perceive no need of a
holistic personnel policy. Older job applicants as per se seen as potential ATZ users with a
short period of gains from human capital investments and therefore rejected
(Köchling/Deimel 2006: 126, 156).
106