Older people don’t just have to worry about ageism with regard to getting fired. In fact, perhaps the biggest impact of ageism is in the hiring process. According to an article by Helen Dennis and Kathryn Thomas in Generations: Journal of the American Society on Aging, the Anti-Ageism Taskforce discovered in 2006 that "bias in hiring is the most prevalent form of age discrimination in the workplace." Indeed, this trend has continued; according to a New York AARP survey referenced by Toni Tileva, a professor in the Anthropology department at American University, 20% of respondents over the age of 50 said that they had been passed up for a job due to their age. In fact, according to the recruitment agency Menlo Partners Staffing, 34% of workers over the age of 40 spend more than 3 months job hunting, and this can get even worse in specific types of jobs, such as those that are heavily involved with technology ("Dirty Little Secrets About Ageism in Silicon Valley"). These older people are consistently viewed as less desirable candidates, even though "employers rate highly the job performance of the older people they do hire" (Tileva).

So if these older workers are so highly praised, why do hiring managers consistently ignore them? It all comes down to the stereotypes (and a little bit of shortsighted company greed). Although these claims are unfounded, it is commonly believed among employers that older workers are uncreative, "resistant to change," and "incapable of adapting to new technology" ("Dirty Little Secrets About Ageism in Silicon Valley). They are also seen as a risk of commitment, as Ashton Applewhite explains in This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism: "They just see gray hair and they write you off...They're afraid to hire you, because they think you're a health risk. You know, you might make their premiums go up. They think it'll cost more money to invest in training you than it's worth it because you might retire in five years. Not that they say any of this to your face" (Applewhite 142). While older workers can sometimes need time and training to adjust to technology, they have often been found to be the hardest workers, and more than make up for temporary shortcomings with their greater experience. This experience, however, can also be a barrier to their search for a job. While it sounds paradoxical, there is a reason for this; companies are attracted by younger workers because they do not have enough job experience that they can demand a higher-paying job, whereas older workers have the resumes (and the living costs) to make these demands. By going for these younger workers, companies can save big on initial costs, although they often pay for it with the lack of experience that these younger employees have. In one 1999 experiment, when two people, a 57-year-old and a 32-year-old with equal credentials, applied for 102 different jobs, "[t]he older applicant received less favorable responses from employers 41.2 percent of the time" (Dennis & Thomas).

It can often be difficult to identify, but here are some noteworthy modes of ageism in the employment process:

• Asking age-related information, such as birthdate and graduation date, during an interview or in an application (AARP – "Age Discrimination Among Adults Age 50-plus in the Labor Force ")

• Setting a cap on the requirement for years of job experience

• Targeting hiring advertisements on sites such as LinkedIn, Facebook, etc. to filter out older workers from receiving the ads – a 2017 investigation found that companies such as Amazon, Goldman Sachs, UPS, and Verizon all put out ads "on Facebook, Google, and LinkedIn [which were] excluded viewing for those over 40" ("Dirty Little Secrets About Ageism in Silicon Valley"). This does not go unnoticed: according to LiveCareer, a shockingly high 86% of people felt that "most job postings [were] addressed to people younger than" them (Paczka).

Sometimes, however, it is even easier to see the ageism at play here. In her New York Times opinion article, "You're How Old? We'll Be in Touch," anti-ageism activist and author Ashton Applewhite tells a number of individual stories that she heard about people's experiences with ageism. One woman, Christina Economos, is a science educator, and has over 40 years of experience in curriculum building. And yet, when she applied for jobs, she was often told that the companies had "found someone more suited," and was sometimes even flat-out ignored (Applewhite, "You're How Old?"). JK Scheinberg, an ex-engineer for Apple, had a similar experience when he decided to reenter the workforce, and applied for a job at the very company that he used to work for: “On the way out, all three of the interviewers singled me out and said, ‘We’ll be in touch,’ ” (Applewhite, "You're How Old?"). It wasn't until several days later, after calling to follow up, that he received an email about a second interview. Somehow, however, this is not the worst of it. A 51-year-old Uber driver that Applewhite had talked to remarked that, after nailing an interview, he overheard the words "[y]eah, he's perfect, but he's too old" (Applewhite, "You're How Old?").

With barriers like these, it's little wonder that the hiring process is a difficult time for many older workers.