There is a well-known expression, often attributed to American novelist Mark Twain, though never verified, that “age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.”
It’s a comforting idea. But for many workers in Australia, it is not the reality.
In the past 20 years, the number of Australians aged over 65 has more than doubled, with 16 per cent continuing to contribute their knowledge, skills and experience in workplaces around the country.
Many Australians are living longer, healthier lives and are choosing to remain in work. This is a profound triumph. Yet age, to many, matters too much. It is still widely treated as a professional liability.
This disconnect is costly: our tightening labour market depends on older workers, but our organisational policies and practices have not kept pace with this shift.
Bridging the gap between our demographic reality and our workplace practices requires more than goodwill. We need an active, uncompromising agenda for change.
To drive this effort, the Australian Human Rights Commission has partnered with Diversity Council Australia to launch a new report, Age, Assumptions and Access at Work: Employee Experiences of Age Inclusion in the Workplace, due to be published 30 June.
This report comes at a critical juncture. It draws on the lived experiences of more than 3000 workers across Australia and provides robust, contemporary insights into how ageism operates at every stage of working life. This offers both a clear reflection of our current workplace cultures and a practical roadmap for meaningful change.
The Great Disconnect
One of the most striking findings is the gap between what people experience and what they report. Age is one of the most common reasons for perceived workplace discrimination and harassment. Yet, complaints made under the Age Discrimination Act 2004 (Cth) made up only 5 per cent of all complaints brought to the Commission in 2024-2025.
Why the disconnect? Because ageism is so deeply normalised that many workers simply accept it as “the way things are”. It is woven into the fabric of workplace culture. When discrimination is this ubiquitous, workers and bystanders’ rarely feel empowered to call it out.
A Shared Challenge across the Lifespan
This report also challenges the idea that ageism is a tug-of-war between generations: that opportunities for older workers come at the expense of younger ones, or vice versa. This couldn’t be further from the truth.
For younger workers, exclusion is an everyday experience. Many told us they felt ignored in meetings, left out of social gatherings or subjected to assumptions about their abilities. These challenges can intensify when younger workers take on caring responsibilities, including for children or family members.
Older workers, meanwhile, face barriers to training and professional development opportunities, limiting their ability to progress or adapt in a changing labour market.
Building an Age-Inclusive Future
Ageism carries a steep price tag. When experienced workers leave prematurely, organisations risk losing institutional knowledge, face avoidable talent shortages, and see diminished productivity and innovation. In a tight labour environment, Australian workplaces need to value age diversity for what it delivers: stronger retention, better team cohesion, greater mobility, and deeper resilience.
Drawing on the recommendations in our report, there are clear steps organisations can take to disrupt age bias:
- Be age-inclusive in learning and development: challenge outdated stereotypes and ensure training and upskilling opportunities are actively offered to employees at every stage of working life. Growth does not have an age limit.
- Normalise flexibility: caring responsibilities and life transitions affect people of all ages. Flexible work should not be an exception. It should support young parents, those caring for elderly relatives and workers transitioning towards retirement.
- Proactively support workplace health and wellbeing: recognise that health needs evolve over time. Create environments that actively support physical and mental wellbeing for a diverse, multigenerational workforce.
- Include age in discrimination and complaints processes: ensure complaint pathways explicitly include age discrimination and collect anonymised data to understand where exclusion occurs in your organisation.
By examining the ways age discrimination hides in plain sight, and by drawing on the insights in this report, we can pull it out of the shadows.
The task now is urgent, but simple. We must build workplaces where people of all ages are valued, respected and given the opportunity to do their best work. Because until we do, age will continue to matter far more than it should.
Robert Fitzgerald AM, Age Discrimination Commissioner
Robert was appointed as Age Discrimination Commissioner with the Australian Human Rights Commission in April 2024.
He is a highly respected lawyer, human rights and social justice advocate, and a leading figure in public and social policy areas.
He was previously a Commissioner on the Royal Commission into the Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, an Australian Productivity Commissioner and NSW Ageing and Disability Commissioner.
Robert was the inaugural Chair of the Australian Charities and Not-for-Profits Commission Advisory Board having served on NGO boards for over 40 years including as President, Australian Council of Social Services.
DCA and AHRC’s new report, Age, Assumptions and Access at Work: Employee Experiences of Age Inclusion in the Workplace, is due to be published 30 June.
Join us on the day from 12:30-1:45 PM for the research launch webinar, Age, Assumptions and Access at Work.