Full text of DOI:10.1093/geront/41.1.111

The Gerontologist
Copyright 2001 by The Gerontological Society of America
Vol. 41, No. 1, 111–122
Ageism, Age Relations, and Garment Industry
Work in Montreal
Julie Ann McMullin1 and Victor W. Marshall2
This study examined the complexities of age relations at work.
Garment workers believed that their fate was linked to ageism
and that their work experience was discounted by manage-
ment. Managers wanted to be rid of older workers because
they commanded higher wages than younger workers. The is-
sue was cost reduction, and age was implicated unintendedly.
Still, managers seemed to use stereotypical images to discour-
age older workers and they did not organize work routines to
facilitate the adaptation of them. Instead, they subcontracted
the easy jobs, relying on the experience of the older employ-
ees for difficult work while not adapting the workplace. Theo-
retically, the authors argue that ageism and age discrimination
can best be understood through a recognition of the impor-
tance of structured age relations and human agency.
(Marshall, 1997; McMullin, 1996). Still others have
used early retirement incentives or attractive sever-
ance packages as a means of eliminating the “dead
wood” within a firm (Hardy et al., 1996). Regardless
of the particular business strategy, rightsizing, down-
sizing, and restructuring are the buzz words used to
signify the elimination of jobs and the termination of
workers in a company’s quest to become more com-
petitive and profitable within the context of contem-
porary capitalism. These words have translated into
loss of employment for thousands of people in Can-
ada and the United States (Advisory Group on Work-
ing Time and the Distribution of Work, 1994).
Key Words: Age discrimination, Inequality, Gender, Class,
Ethnicity
Moore provided some indication of the magnitude
of job displacement in the United States, estimating
that “roughly two to three million people were dis-
placed each year from 1982 to 1991” (Moore, 1996,
p. 20). The volume of, and reasons for, displacement
varied by changes in the business cycle, with dis-
placement increasing during recessionary periods.
However, many firms use recessionary layoffs as a
means to downsize their workforce. Indicators of so-
cial class (e.g., occupation, education, wage level),
as well as industry, gender, race, and age are among
the factors that are associated with the likelihood of
job displacement (Couch, 1998; Gardner, 1993; Herz,
1990; Kinsella & Gist, 1995; Kletzer, 1991; Lauzon,
1995). Persons in lower social classes are generally at
a greater risk of job displacement than are those in
higher social classes, and workers in goods-produc-
ing industries tend to be at greater risk of job dis-
placement than those in other industries (Gardner,
1993; Herz, 1990; Lauzon, 1995). Men are more
likely than women to be displaced from their jobs,
and in the United States Black and Hispanic workers
are at a greater risk of job displacement than are
White workers (Gardner, 1993; Herz, 1990; Kletzer,
1991). Finally, younger and older workers are more
likely to be displaced than are workers in the middle
age groups (Gardner, 1993, 1995; Lauzon, 1995).
Among these factors, age is perhaps the most under-
studied dimension of inequality within sociology in
general, and within the subfield of work and occupa-
tions in particular. Very little is known about the role
that age plays in disadvantaging certain groups of peo-
ple relative to others within labor markets. In fact,
whereas youth unemployment has emerged as a policy
and research issue over the last decade, older dis-
In response to the widespread recessions of the
early 1980s and 1990s and the simultaneous increase
in global trade and competition, many firms devel-
oped restructuring strategies that were aimed at re-
ducing “excessive” labor costs (Harrison, 1994; Men-
zies, 1996; Rifkin, 1995). The specific strategies used
depended on the characteristics of the industry or
firm. Some organizations moved their production
plants from Canada or the United States to countries,
such as Mexico or Brazil, where labor costs are lower
(Hardy, Hazelrigg, & Quadagno, 1996; Leach & Win-
son, 1995). Others declared bankruptcy and then
opened a few months later under a different name
and with a nonunionized, less expensive labor force
This article draws on a case study conducted by the Issues of an Aging
Workforce Project and funded by the Innovations Fund of Human Re-
sources Development Canada to Victor W. Marshall, Principal Investigator.
The research could not have been conducted without the support of the In-
ternational Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union (now UNITE), G. Roy,
Canadian director, and the Quebec Fashion Apparel Manufacturer’s
Guild, S. Purcell, executive director. We also thank J. Wineman, director,
Retiree Services Department of UNITE, and the garment workers, company
owners, and union officials in Montreal who took part in the study. The re-
search team for the design, data collection, and analysis in this case study
included J. Edwardh, A. Ford, S. LeBlanc, and the authors.
Address correspondence to Julie McMullin, Department of Sociology,
University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada N6A 5C2. E-mail:
mcmullin@julian.uwo.ca
1Department of Sociology, University of Western Ontario, London,
Ontario, Canada.
2UNC Institute on Aging and Department of Sociology, University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Vol. 41, No. 1, 2001
111

placed workers tend to be overlooked (Couch, 1998;
LeBlanc & McMullin, 1997). This remains true even
though unemployment rates among older workers in-
creased between 1980 and 1990 in most industrialized
countries and the unemployment rates among male
workers aged 55 to 59 were higher than the unemploy-
ment rates among male workers aged 25 to 54 (Can-
ada, Spain, Sweden, and the United States are excep-
tions here; Gardner, 1995; Kinsella & Gist, 1995;
Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Devel-
opment, 1995; Schellenberg, 1994). Further, older
workers have longer durations of unemployment (ap-
proximately 20 weeks among men and 15 weeks
among women in the United States) than younger
workers (approximately 15 weeks among men and 10
weeks among women in the United States; Kinsella &
Gist, 1995; Love & Torrence, 1989) and tend to be
overrepresented among discouraged workers (in the
United States, older male workers represent 8% of eco-
nomically active men and 28% of discouraged male
workers; older female workers represent 7% of eco-
nomically active women and 21% of discouraged fe-
male workers) (Kinsella & Gist, 1995). Further, if and
when older, unemployed workers find a job, their re-
employment earnings are less (Love & Torrence, 1989).
Employment and displacement statistics shed little
light on the circumstances of the workers themselves
or on their perceptions of job loss. Further, age pat-
terns in job displacement are often interpreted as co-
hort effects. Researchers have suggested that older
workers are at a greater risk of job displacement when
compared with middle-aged workers because as a
group they are less educated and are disproportion-
ately employed in industries that have been the hard-
est hit by restructuring. Although cohort effects are
important, other factors such as ageism may contrib-
ute to later-life job displacement and to other detri-
mental aspects of older workers’ lives. In this article
we address the role that ageism plays in garment in-
dustry work and displacement. Before turning to the
data, we consider what ageism is and how it might
be conceptualized.
tudes legitimate “the use of chronological age to mark
out classes of people who are systematically denied
resources and opportunities that others enjoy, and who
suffer the consequences of such denigration, ranging
from well-meaning patronage to unambiguous vilifi-
cation” (Bytheway, 1995, p.14). Thus, there are two
interconnected dimensions of ageism: an ageist ide-
ology, which includes negative stereotypes, beliefs,
and attitudes, and age discrimination, which is be-
havior that excludes certain people and places them
in a disadvantaged situation relative to others on the
basis of their chronological age.
In Western societies, ageism occurs within families
and households, government agencies, health care sys-
tems, and waged labor markets (Laws, 1995; Pal-
more, 1990). Many government regulations and pro-
grams are established or interpreted with a particular
age group in mind and thus inadvertently discrimi-
nate against persons in other age groups (Laws, 1995;
LeBlanc & McMullin, 1997; Palmore, 1990). Job re-
training programs are a good example of this type of
discrimination because they are generally targeted
toward people of “employable” ages or of specific
gender, racial, or disability statuses (LeBlanc & Mc-
Mullin, 1997).
In this article we focus on ageism that occurs
within the context of waged labor markets (Laws,
1995; Palmore, 1990), one example of which is the
practice of mandatory retirement. Although manda-
tory retirement is prohibited in the United States by
the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA),
certain occupations (e.g., airline pilots) are exempt
from this legislation. The Canadian Charter of Rights
and Freedoms states that individuals are equal under
the law without discrimination on the basis of age,
but only three provinces have legislation prohibiting
age discrimination, making mandatory retirement an
acceptable practice in the other provinces (McPher-
son, 1998). Hence, mandatory retirement policy is one
example of age discrimination, whereby people are
disadvantaged on the basis of chronological age
rather than ability.
Beyond these mandatory retirement issues, some
evidence suggests that age discrimination in employ-
ment may be relatively widespread. Between 1967
(when the ADEA was enacted) and 1983, millions of
dollars in compensation were awarded to thousands
of Americans for age discrimination in employment
(Atchley, 1988). National surveys conducted in the
United States in the 1980s suggested that 80% of
Americans in general and 61% of employers in par-
ticular believe that “most employers discriminate
against older people and make it difficult for them to
find work” (Atchley, 1988, p. 268). Similarly, a recent
Canadian survey of counselors in government unem-
ployment offices across the country found that 84%
moderately or strongly agree that “employers dis-
criminate against older workers in hiring practices”
(Underhill, Marshall, & Deliencourt, 1997, p. 3). Fur-
ther, older workers may be overlooked for promo-
tions or fired, simply on the basis of their age (Falk &
Falk, 1997; Palmore, 1990; Rodeheaver, 1992).
What is Ageism?
Although ageism can refer to “any prejudice or dis-
crimination against or in favor of an age group” (Pal-
more, 1990, p.15), the term has generally been used
to denote systematic negative stereotyping of and dis-
crimination against older people simply because they
are old (Butler, 1969; Vincent, 1995). Ageism fre-
quently rests on a conceptualization of age in chro-
nological years and is thus defined as “the attribution
of characteristics, abilities, limitations or events to the
mere passing of time” (Bodily, 1991, p. 258). Age-
ism involves beliefs (e.g., old people are ugly, sickly,
and unproductive) and attitudes (e.g., general prefer-
ences for youth and being young rather than old) that
often translate into discriminatory action (Bytheway,
1995; Palmore, 1990). Ageist beliefs and attitudes
may not, in and of themselves, be harmful. However,
age discrimination occurs if these beliefs and atti-
112
The Gerontologist

Very little research has examined the extent or na-
ture of ageism within the workplace and research that
has done so often has located the problem at an indi-
vidual level; individuals are held to discriminate
against others because they hold prejudicial attitudes
and stereotypes about them. But, as the following
section shows, ageism is not fully determined by ide-
ologies and their component stereotypes and atti-
tudes. Rather, social structural issues influence and
shape ageism within many contexts, including that of
paid work.
ability of the individual to adjust to aging, naturally
diminishing physical or mental capacities. Rather,
political economists have attributed age discrimina-
tion to the structural characteristics of the state, the
economy, and inequalities in the distribution and al-
location of resources that these institutions create
(Estes, 1979, 1991; Guillemard, 1983; Myles, 1984,
1989; Phillipson, 1982, 1998; Townsend, 1981, 1986;
Walker, 1981). Ageism may be a consequence of, or
provide a legitimating ideological foundation for, dis-
criminatory age patterns.
The social construction of age as an organizing
feature of social life is recognized in the political
economy approach, and structural factors that limit
the opportunities of older adults are at the core of
these analyses. However, the approach tends to re-
duce the analysis of ageism and social inequality in
later life to issues of social class. Like Marx (1967;
Marx & Engels, 1970), political economy of aging re-
searchers have emphasized the relations of produc-
tion in their conceptualization of social class, be-
cause these relations structure behavior and privilege
between those who own the means of production
and those who do not (Guillemard, 1982, 1983;
Myles, 1984, 1989; Phillipson, 1982; Townsend, 1981;
Walker, 1981). Missing in most political economy
accounts is an analysis of the relationship between
age relations and class relations as they structure so-
cial inequality at various life course stages. And, as
others have pointed out (Kohli, 1988; Marshall & Tin-
dale, 1978–79), the economic and social locations of
older people reflect not only class inequalities in
early life but also unique processes that are struc-
tured by age relations as well.
The preceding review highlights the importance of
the relationship among social structure and ageism as
it is identified in both the political economy ap-
proach and Law’s work. In this article, we explore
this relationship further by focusing specifically on
structured age relations. Although the term age rela-
tions is used sparingly within the gerontological liter-
ature, it has not been developed through a critical
lens, as a concept that refers to a structural dimen-
sion of social life. We believe that it is important to
consider the structural nature of age relations in their
own right, and the ways in which they intersect with
other sets of structured social relations such as class,
gender, and ethnic/race relations.
In our view, social relations (such as age, class,
gender, and ethnic/race relations) are fundamental
elements of the social structure that produce endur-
ing, orderly, and patterned social systems. Structured
social relations are based on the varied rights and
privileges that define social relationships (see Wright,
1999, for a discussion of this point with respect to so-
cial class). Hence, a relational understanding of age
requires an emphasis on “structured forms of power,
organization, direction, and regulation that exist in
modern societies and through which ruling groups
maintain and reproduce their dominant positions”
(Layder, 1994, p. 159; see also Smith, 1987). By tak-
ing age relations into account in assessments of
Rethinking Ageism: Structured Age Relations and
Waged Labor Markets
There is little doubt that ageist beliefs, held by in-
dividuals, play a role in determining the nature of
ageism within waged labor markets. However, as with
sexism and racism there is likely a significant struc-
tural component to ageism that is not captured by
ideology alone. Two approaches to this issue have
informed our analysis. The first approach is from
Laws (1995), who, from a postmodernist perspective,
moved toward a discussion of ageist structures by
discussing ageism in relation to oppression and power
relations. Drawing on the work of Young (1990), Laws
argued that oppressed older people are subject to
marginalization, violence, powerlessness, exploitation,
and cultural imperialism, all historically and geo-
graphically situated or grounded in sites of ageism
such as families and households, government agen-
cies, health care systems, and waged labor markets.
Throughout her analysis, Laws placed emphasis
on the conceptualization of “age as a social relation,
one dimension of a complex set of relations between
people” (Laws, 1995, p. 112). According to Laws, age
relations structure ageism that “like racism and sex-
ism, is a form of prejudice, a form of oppression that
not only limits people who are the object of that op-
pression but which also shapes perceptions of peo-
ple, both young and old, who hold ageist attitudes”
(Laws, 1995, p. 113). Regarding ageism in waged la-
bor markets, Laws noted that later life labor force exit
has defined old age at an ideological level, which
produces and reproduces the institution of retirement.
She discussed ageism as the marginalization and
powerlessness that older and retired workers experi-
ence and as the material losses that these workers
face in retirement.
In the literature on aging and social inequality, po-
litical economy theorists have located social struc-
ture at the heart of their analyses, and this approach
is the second upon which our analysis rests. Political
economy theorists have explained the relative situa-
tion of older individuals by focusing on the interrela-
tionship between the economy, the polity, and the
ideological structures that these systems of domina-
tion construct and reconstruct. In this approach, age
discrimination (behavior) is not viewed as a simple
consequence of ageist ideology (attitudes based on
negative stereotypes). Nor are ageist attitudes or age
discriminatory policies seen as direct results of an in-
Vol. 41, No. 1, 2001
113

waged labor markets, we are suggesting that age is
implicated in productive social relations.
dents; but the individual account that is given in a fo-
cus group could also be taken to characterize the
experiences and perspectives of the person who ren-
dered that account.
In our analysis, we have made three related as-
sumptions about social life: first, that social roles,
normative expectations, socialization processes, and
role sanctions are grounded in structured social rela-
tions that are characterized more by conflict than by
consensus; second, that, social structure does not
stand outside of the human, social behavior that pro-
duces it, yet it nevertheless takes on properties that
transcend the behavior of those who construct it; and
third, although these properties of durability con-
strain and limit the agency of the individual, they
never do so completely (for more detail on this theo-
retical approach, see McMullin & Marshall, 1999).
With this as our theoretical backdrop, we now turn
to our case study of garment workers in Montreal to
explore whether ideological (i.e., attitudes, beliefs,
values) and/or behavioral (i.e., discrimination) di-
mensions of ageism are at play within these workers’
lives. To do so we first assess whether garment work-
ers discussed their labor market experiences by offer-
ing explanations about them that relied on ageist atti-
tudes, beliefs, or values. Second, we explore whether
older garment workers believed that they had been
excluded or eliminated from employment opportuni-
ties because of their age. After presenting our analy-
ses, we conclude by discussing how these ideologi-
cal and behavioral dimensions of ageism can be
explained theoretically by drawing on the intersec-
tion of structured age relations and individual actions.
Access to the garment industry in Montreal was fa-
cilitated through contacts with the Council of the In-
ternational Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union (now
called UNITE) and by the Quebec Fashion Apparel
Manufacturers’ Guild. Because of these Union and
Guild links our sample comprised the most “privi-
leged” garment workers, who work in unionized shops.
Between May 1994 and March 1995, 12 focus group
discussions were conducted in Montreal, two with
retired workers, three with displaced workers, and
seven with employed workers. The focus group dis-
cussions were relatively unstructured. However, the
focus group mediator followed a list of guidelines de-
veloped by the IAW research team and always asked
several questions relating to the key themes of the
project—career mobility, health, retirement, technol-
ogy, and family.
The focus groups ranged in size from 4 to 10 peo-
ple, with a total of 79 individuals taking part in the
study. Five of the focus groups comprised employees
who worked together in five different shops. Two of
these shops were relatively large by industry stan-
dards, employing between 80 and 100 people. Two
of the shops were of average size (about 50 people)
and one was small (about 20 people). These discus-
sions were held on work time and the IAW project
paid these employees for their time away from their
jobs. Participants either volunteered to participate in
a focus group at the request of the shop’s union offi-
cial or the union official chose who would partici-
pate. In the other two employee focus groups, union
officials asked workers who were not necessarily em-
ployed at the same shop to participate in the IAW
study. These focus groups were held at the union
headquarters outside of normal working hours.
The retiree focus groups comprised members of
the union’s retiree club. The retirees met every Thurs-
day at the union headquarters to participate in activi-
ties such as playing cards, and the IAW focus groups
were planned as one of these activities. Those who
chose not to participate carried on (in another room)
with their regular Thursday activities. The IAW project
contacted displaced workers through the union as
well. Again, a union official asked for volunteers
among employees who were currently looking for
work. To preserve anonymity and confidentiality, fo-
cus group participants and the garment shops are re-
ferred to by pseudonyms, chosen to reflect the eth-
nicity of the participants (Snell, 1993).
Methods
Sample
We used data from a case study of the Montreal
Garment Industry, one of seven case studies in differ-
ent industrial sectors conducted under the direction
of the second author as part of a project called Issues
of an Aging Workforce: A Study to Inform Human Re-
sources Policy Development (IAW). In this case study,
researchers collected archival data and conducted
key informant interviews; focus group discussions with
employed, retired, and displaced garment workers; and
industry representative surveys. We chose this case
study because, unlike the other case studies, the data
from the Montreal garment industry provided infor-
mation from retired and displaced workers, as well
as current employees. This allowed us to analyze
perceptions of ageism among current as well as dis-
placed and retired workers, which was not possible
using data from the other case studies.
The analysis relied primarily on the focus group
discussions (see Morgan, 1993, for a discussion of
this methodology). Researchers can use focus group
data in two ways: as documentary evidence to con-
struct a case study of the firm or industry under study
or as evidence about the individual providing the
data. For example, these discussions could help us to
understand general conditions, such as age and gen-
der discrimination in a firm, as perceived by respon-
The involvement of union officials in selecting our
sample of garment workers created a potential bias
because these workers may have been chosen be-
cause they were particularly sensitive to union issues.
This would be problematic if the aim of the research
was to illustrate trends and rates and to generalize
these findings to other populations. However, our in-
tent was to use a qualitative methodology to docu-
ment the processes and mechanisms through which
114
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ageism might occur. Thus, for our purposes, a height-
ened level of consciousness regarding union issues
may have been beneficial. A second, and potentially
more harmful bias, is that our study was based only
on privileged, unionized workers or former union-
ized workers. More research is needed to determine
if the processes and mechanisms of ageism are appli-
cable to more marginalized workers within this in-
dustry.
bec garment industry). Fifty-one percent of the partic-
ipants were employed, 18% were retired, and 32%
were displaced. Thirty-nine percent of the respon-
dents reported French as their mother tongue, and
the same percentage reported that Canada was their
birth country. Forty-one percent stated their mother
tongue as Italian, and 38% said they were born in It-
aly. Much smaller percentages reported other mother
tongues and birth countries.
We did not specifically ask respondents about their
income or education, in part because industry aver-
ages suggest that the majority of these workers are
poorly paid and have low levels of education. For in-
stance, whereas 71% of the Canadian workforce has
at least a secondary school diploma, this compares to
only 44% of the workers in the Canadian garment in-
dustry. Regarding income, the average hourly wage
for unionized male workers in Quebec’s garment in-
dustry is $11.89 CA and for unionized female work-
ers it is $9.22 CA.
As part of the research design, older workers (aged
45 and older) were specifically targeted for participa-
tion in this study. Respondents were not systemati-
cally asked how old they were and hence precise age
breakdowns could not be generated. In the analysis
of the qualitative data, the age of the respondent was
indicated if known and reported as unknown other-
wise. Notably, most of the respondents who were not
questioned about their age were in the displaced and
retired focus groups, and these people were most
likely older than 50.
Sample Characteristics
Table 1 shows the sample characteristics. We
make no claim that our sample was representative of
the garment industry as a whole. However, the sam-
ple did reflect industry trends in the distribution of
gender and occupation (the only variables in Table 1
for which there is accurate industry data). The per-
centage of women in our sample was somewhat
higher than in the Quebec garment industry (96% vs
82%, see the Results section for a discussion of gen-
der composition of the industry) but nonetheless re-
flected the fact that the majority of workers in this
industry are women. It is unclear why a dispropor-
tionate number of women chose to participate in this
study. Fifty-eight percent of these respondents were
married, and three quarters were parents. Sixty-six
percent of them were or had been sewing machine
operators (compared with 69% of women in the Que-
Table 1. Characteristics of Focus Group Participants (N ϭ 79)
These sample characteristics paint a picture of gar-
ment workers in the Quebec industry and in our study.
It is a picture that is well known in the industry and
one that is perhaps best described by one of our key
informants, Daniel Dubuc, director of the Ladies’
Clothing Joint Commission, an organization that com-
prises both guild members and union representatives.
He said the following in describing a typical garment
worker:
Variable
n
%
Gender
Men
Women
Marital Status
Married
Single
Widowed
Divorced
Missing
Parent Status
Parent
Childless
Missing
3
76
4
96
46
8
8
7
10
58
10
10
9
13
She is a woman, not well educated I’m afraid. Very
stubborn, with courage, she is an immigrant, she is in
her forties, she has backaches, and she has industrial
handicaps.
60
15
4
76
19
5
Occupation
Machine operators
Other
52
19
8
66
24
10
Analysis
Missing
The analysis was conducted in two stages whereby
the data were first physically organized into theme
areas and then organized into analytically meaning-
ful categories (Knodel, 1993). In the first, mechanical
stage of the analysis, segments of text were coded into
theme areas that were driven by the IAW project—
family, career, retirement, technology and training,
and health. The data in each of these theme areas
were coded a second time for cross-referencing pur-
poses.
The second, more explicitly interpretive, stage of
the analysis involved establishing criteria for organiz-
ing the data into analytically meaningful subdivisions
and then searching for patterns within and between
Employment Status
Employed
Displaced
Retired
Country of Birth
Canada
Italy
Other
Missing
Mother Tongue
French
Italian
Other
Missing
40
25
14
51
32
18
31
30
13
5
39
38
16
6
31
32
11
5
39
41
14
6
Note: Percentages may not add to 100 because of rounding.
Vol. 41, No. 1, 2001
115

these subdivisions (Knodel, 1993). This process in-
volved searching for expected subthemes (e.g., ageist
attitudes) and identifying subthemes that were less
expected (e.g., the impact of bankruptcy laws and
factory closures on the relations of production).
(men make up between 71% and 92% of the three
highest paid occupations), and a disproportionate
number of women are in the low paying jobs (women
constitute between 88% and 96% of the three lowest
paid occupations). There is also ethnic segregation
within the Montreal garment industry. The tendency
is for certain ethnic groups to be concentrated in par-
ticular shops, with higher wages being paid in shops
where most workers are French Canadian (McMullin,
1996). Recent immigrants, such as the Vietnamese,
are more likely to find low-wage, nonunionized work
in shops that accept work that has been contracted
out from other shops, or even to be home workers.
Past research has shown that women, the working
class, and ethnic workers are in disadvantaged labor
market positions. In the case of garment work, these
factors are simultaneously at play in creating an inter-
locking system of disadvantage for the majority of
workers. Because past work has dealt with these in-
tersections in relation to garment work (Das Gupta,
1992; Frager, 1992; Gannage, 1986; Phizacklea,
1983, 1990), we simply make note of this as the con-
text within which our analysis is situated. All of these
factors—class, gender, and ethnicity—structure work
within the garment industry and create systems of rel-
ative disadvantage and powerlessness for those who
work there. In the following sections of this article,
we show that age is yet another dimension through
which systems of disadvantage are at work.
For the specific purposes of this study, the career,
retirement, and technology and training theme areas
were coded into subtheme areas that dealt specifi-
cally with ageism. Comments that were made in the
focus groups about age were coded according to
whether they reflected negative experiences, atti-
tudes, beliefs, or values about older people or aging.
We coded any instance in which focus groups dis-
cussed their work/displacement/retirement experiences
by offering explanations about them that relied on
ageist attitudes, beliefs, or values into a general cate-
gory that we referred to as ideological ageism. Next,
we coded work/displacement/retirement experiences
that excluded or eliminated older workers from em-
ployment opportunities into a second category that
we referred to as age discrimination.
Notably, we relied on the perceptions of the work-
ers themselves as evidence of ageism within the gar-
ment industry in Montreal. Indeed, it was our pur-
pose in this study to assess ageism from the point of
view of older workers themselves. In the following
discussion we see that workers implicated the own-
ers and managers of the companies they worked for
as being ageist, and they implicated themselves as
being ageist in some cases as well. Methodologically,
we privileged the knowledge, perceptions, and expe-
riences of older workers themselves to better under-
stand the power relations at play in garment work
(see Smith, 1987, for a discussion of this method).
Ideological Ageism
Past research has shown that sex and ethnic origin
are bases of division among the working class and
that employers discriminate on the basis of sex and
ethnic origin by restricting access to certain jobs. Al-
though age is well recognized as an axis of division
among workers (as a basis of seniority, or a basis on
which a worker loses the right to work), less is known
about whether age is constructed as a cross-cutting
basis of division among the working class or if, and
how, ageism is implicated within the workplace. In
this section, we first examine the role that ageist atti-
tudes and beliefs play in dividing the workers and
how these issues are perceived as threats to older
workers’ job security. Second, we explore issues re-
lating to workers’ perceptions of age and productiv-
ity. We show how older workers may themselves
hold ageist views regarding their own productivity
that in turn may conceal underlying reasons for re-
ported productivity decline.
The experiences of some of the focus group partic-
ipants illustrate that a worker’s old age may be used
by management as a means of intimidating workers.
For instance, Madeline (retired, age unknown) told us
about how she continued to sign grievances with the
union despite considerable opposition from her em-
ployer. In the end the employer tried to convince
Madeline that she was too old to continue to work
and that she should retire:
Results
Garment Work in Montreal: Class, Ethnicity,
and Gender
Before turning to our discussion of ageism, we sit-
uate the analysis within the context of the more gen-
eral nature of garment work in Montreal. The percep-
tions of the focus group participants about the nature
of work in the garment industry concurred with past
research, which has shown that garment work is hard
work (Das Gupta, 1992; Frager, 1992; Gannage, 1986;
Phizacklea, 1983, 1990). Managers and owners uti-
lize workers in a quest to maximize productivity and
profits. They control their workers by restricting the
opportunities of those who sign grievances, by mov-
ing “problem” workers to different departments or
jobs, and by limiting the use of bathrooms and drink-
ing fountains (McMullin, 1996). These issues point to
how social class, as it is conceptualized by research-
ers within the political economy tradition, structures
the nature of garment work and how individual own-
ers actively use their power to exploit workers.
Gender and ethnicity also structure garment work.
At the industrial level, 82% of the workers in the la-
dies’ clothing industry in Quebec are women and
jobs within the industry are segregated along gender
lines. Most of the highly paid jobs are held by men
We know that even if the union protects us and they
sign grievances, the more they sign grievances—the
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worse you are regarded. Well I did that anyway. I
signed to return to work, as they say, I certainly expe-
rienced it after. I went to the office six, seven times a
day and he [the boss] encouraged me to retire at the
age of 57. . . . [He said] “You realize that you are too
old to work now.” I said, “No, I’ll retire at the same
time as everybody else.”
worker cannot produce at or above this rate then
their wage suffers. Clarece (employed, aged 57) sug-
gested that her age limited her ability to produce the
amount of pieces required for her to make a sufficient
wage. As she put it,
Sometimes, I have to give tickets for dresses which
aren’t finished yet to get my pay at the end. They
come and get the tickets. Sometimes, I haven’t even
had the dresses at my place. Well, I have to go and
get a package, then, give my tickets. [laugh] It’s not
funny at all. I should be younger to get more of them
done, but I try, I try to get more of them done.
The collective agreement states that employees
have the right to sign grievances against their em-
ployers without fear of retaliation (International La-
dies’ Garment Workers’ Union, 1994). However, in
Madeline’s view, the fact that her employer tried to
convince her that she was too old to work was linked
to the fact that she continued to sign grievances. Ac-
cording to Madeline, the owner used old age as a
mask behind which the true nature of the conflict—
signing too many grievances—was concealed. Al-
though the collective agreement and Quebec legisla-
tion also state that employers must not discriminate
on the basis of a worker’s age, this employer tried to
convince a “problem worker” to retire because she
was too old to work. Thus, the owner attempted to
hide the class-based nature of this conflict behind the
mask of old age. In doing so, he reinforced ageist be-
liefs and attitudes that suggest that older people
should not work. This points to an intersection be-
tween social class and age whereby owners use age-
ist views about older workers as a means of class in-
timidation.
However, when Clarece was asked by Angela, the
focus group leader, more specifically about her views
on the relationship between age and productivity, she
elaborated by suggesting that the nature of the work
had also changed as she has grown older.
Clarece: My nimble fingers are gone! [laugh]
Angela: Your productivity decreased with age?
Clarece: It’s not only age, because, I have been mak-
ing samples on an hourly basis for almost 8 years,
so . . . one dress, one dress, one dress. While now,
it’s much more. . . . You can’t look up. You have to
work, work. So, it’s not the same.
It is widely believed that productivity declines with
age, for a number of reasons. Workers are thought to
lose cognitive speed and physical stamina; to have
greater difficulty adapting to new electronic, machine
process, and organizational technologies; and to be less
motivated to make these adaptations than younger
workers. However, the research basis for these com-
mon beliefs is thin, and recent research in particular
severely qualifies or contradicts these views (American
Association of Retired Persons, 1986; Berkowitz,
1988; Butler, 1985; Centre for Studies of Aging,
1995; Ilmarinen & Louhevaara, 1994; Knowles, 1988;
McEvoy & Cascio, 1989; McNaught & Barth, 1992;
Rix, 1994) or suggests that any limitations can be eas-
ily overcome with thoughtful training and work orga-
nizational innovations (Itzin & Phillipson, 1993; Mi-
tal, 1994; Rix, 1990). In fact, cognitive decline is
minimal during the normal working ages and rarely
so great as to fall below levels required for performance
(Cerella, 1990; Charness & Bosman, 1992; Earles &
Salthouse, 1995); the case studies conducted in the
IAW project indicated that physical health is not a
strong barrier to work in most settings, and that older
workers are quite receptive to technological and or-
ganizational changes. In the garment industry, how-
ever, the work is physically demanding, and age may
be associated with declining productivity at younger
ages than in many other industrial sectors.
Indeed, Clarece offered several explanations for
her productivity decline that were not directly related
to old age. She went on to say that her employers
sent the easy work out to contractors and kept the
hard work for the experienced employees in the shop.
This served to reduce the number of pieces that em-
ployees would make and, in turn, limited their wages.
Hence, in the end, the ways in which owners orga-
nized the work process seemed at least as problem-
atic for Clarece’s productivity as did her own old age.
However, because Clarece prioritized age in her dis-
cussion and joked about the relationship between
her age and productivity, ageist stereotypes about di-
minishing capacities were reinforced and internalized.
Some of the older workers believed that the speed
and dexterity associated with youth is less important
to productivity than the skill and experience char-
acteristic of older workers. As François (employed,
aged 60) put it,
It’s experience. . . . Older people’s experience is
helping youngsters. Experience. They make less mis-
takes than a young person. A young person can be
active—but, he makes mistakes, a lot of mistakes.
Still others linked the relationship between pro-
ductivity and aging to a combination of stereotypes
regarding the speed at which older people can learn
and the structural conditions in the garment industry
that lead to company closures. Hence, according to
these respondents, if older employees remained in
the same shop, the productivity between younger and
older workers would be equal. However, the produc-
Discussions of the relationship between age and
productivity emerged in most of the focus groups,
and in one the discussion focused around productiv-
ity and piece work. Wages in piece work shops de-
pend on average levels of productivity. If a particular
Vol. 41, No. 1, 2001
117

tivity of older workers might suffer if they were forced
to change shops after having been employed in the
same company for 25 or 30 years. This view is illus-
trated by the following focus group discussion:
If workers perceived that their old age was the rea-
son that they were no longer employed, the sense of
pride that they had in themselves and their work ap-
peared to be threatened. In the following discussion
older workers defended their levels of productivity by
comparing their work experience to the work experi-
ence of younger women.
Dominique (aged 63): Apart from that, when there is
a change in work, the work isn’t different but there is
a change of place. In each place, there is a way of
doing things. Also we are a little old and we can’t
learn new ways of another person quickly. That’s
why, that’s the problem.
Angelina: They call us the “old women” but when
they put us out they have to bring in three others to
do the same work.
Angela: So you, so you have a problem learning?
Carla (aged 59): To learn the ways of another person.
Angela: Oh, I see. Ah, OK.
Madeline: Yes, [but] young people do have some ex-
perience.
Angelina: But experience is really us, young people
can’t have experience. They need three young peo-
ple to replace one of us.
Dominique: Because we are used to a certain way
OK. Because of working in the same place, therefore
we are all used to it. But then to start to learn at an-
other place—
Madeline: To do the same production. It takes three.
I don’t want to be racist but those little Vietnamese
who are coming in, because the Quebecers in the in-
dustry, you can count them on the fingers of one
hand.
Angela: Other methods.
In defending their levels of productivity, these fo-
cus group participants responded to the widely held
belief that older workers are less productive. The fact
that they acknowledged this belief in their discussion
inadvertently reproduced the very view that they were
trying to counter. Further, the reference to “those lit-
tle Vietnamese,” suggests that workers’ perceptions of
their situations were bound to the intersections of
ethnicity and age. The comparison these workers made
between themselves and younger ethnic workers sug-
gests that these workers felt a sense of division on the
basis of age and that this division was enhanced by
ethnicity.
Carla: Yes, other methods, that’s it.
Dominique: Yes, it is not all the same. When you are
in one place—
Antonnia (aged 56): The coats are all the same but
the way of working depends.
Dominique: I work one way, the others work another
way, then it is hard to learn afresh. We have no more
patience, like what we had when we were young.
When we were young we had more patience but
now—
Carla: It is the same thing, in your home, you have
one way, I have another way in the home, the com-
panies are like that. One company has a way of work-
ing and another company has another way of working.
But the employers are looking for those of us who
can work fast. When you work in the same place you
work fast because you are used to it, but if I change
places, I can’t do it quickly because I have to think of
how the others do it. The others are not pleased that
I’m not fast.
Age Discrimination and Factory Closures
We now turn from ideological to behavioral di-
mensions of ageism, focusing on the issue of factory
closures and resulting job displacement. The compet-
itive nature and structure of garment work influences
the business practices that employers use to maxi-
mize profits. A strategy that has a long-standing his-
tory in the garment industry is that of hiring the least
expensive workforce. One method that employers
have increasingly used to reduce labor expenses is to
replace unionized workers, who tend to be older,
with a younger, nonunionized, less expensive work-
force. Companies close down and then reopen a few
months later under a different name and employing
nonunionized labor. According to Gerald Roy, the
Canadian director of the International Ladies’ Gar-
ment Workers’ Union, the disgrace attached to bank-
ruptcy in the past has dissipated and now firms have
lawyers who tell them exactly how to go out of busi-
ness; how to escape paying their debts to the em-
ployees, landlords, machinery rental agencies, and
banks; and how and when to open up another, non-
unionized, shop. Roy highlighted the seriousness of
Antonnia: Sometimes you forget, sometimes you for-
get how to do the piece. Sometimes you haven’t for-
gotten the other way and you give it to the person. It
is like, like the person is younger and can learn right
away. People like us [it’s] hard.
Two age-related perceptions emerge from this con-
versation. First, these workers believed that older
people have difficulty learning new methods of work.
Second, they believed that older people have less pa-
tience than younger people. Productivity may suffer
when workers of any age are forced to change their
habitual work practices, but these workers believed
that age is at issue in learning and patience.
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The Gerontologist

this problem for apparel industry workers in the fol-
lowing comment:
and old age to do so. In this case, the strategy that
managers used to eliminate the older workers was un-
successful. The company closed and reopened a
short time late under a different name and without
the employment of these older workers.
This is a story of class conflict—employers trying
to eliminate a highly paid, unionized workforce—but
it is one that intersects with age. For the workers who
lost their jobs with this firm, high wages were not
thought to be the reason. Instead, the perception
among these workers was that their old age resulted
in their unemployment. As Carmen went on to say,
It is too easy to open and close a company in the ap-
parel industry. What is deploring is that the workers
are always at the end of the process. They lose con-
ditions of work, they lose their paycheck, they lose
vacation pay, they lose their health benefits, they
lose their pension benefits, they lose and lose and
they are getting older.
The fact that Roy mentioned the age of workers in
his statement suggests that older workers may be par-
ticularly disadvantaged by this practice. Indeed, al-
though the intention of this business strategy is to
eliminate the union, one consequence of this prac-
tice is that older workers are forced out of their jobs
and the labor force because, as we will see in the fol-
lowing section, old age works against them in finding
subsequent employment.
Several retired workers suggested that their previ-
ous employers used subtle age-related strategies in their
attempts to make older workers quit their jobs. Car-
men, for instance, described how her bosses moved
older workers from sit-down jobs to jobs that re-
quired them to stand up. When the focus group me-
diator asked why, the participants responded:
We are out, three or four of us, because, we left on
the same day, we were put out like dogs. I was more
respected when I was young. With all the experience
I had, it counted for more.
The degradation that Carmen felt when she was
“put out like dogs” appeared to be linked to her age,
because she went on to say that she was more re-
spected in her youth. Carmen believed, however, that
she should be afforded more respect now, not be-
cause of her age, but because of her experience as a
worker. This points to a contradiction between an
ideology that suggests that one should respect the work
experience that is associated with aging and the value
that is attached to youth in Canada and the United
States. On one hand, the logic of capitalism suggests
that experienced workers should be valued more be-
cause their productivity levels should be higher. On
the other hand, common perceptions of older work-
ers’ productivity declines attenuates the value that is
attached to experience.
Few of the garment workers in our study had been
untouched by factory closures. When factories close,
garment workers find themselves out of work in an
economy where jobs are hard to find. Among the
workers we talked with, the perception that their old
age worked against them getting hired was strong
and real. Celine (employed, age unknown) described
her search for work as follows:
Angelina (age unknown): Why? Ha ha!
Carmen (aged 64): Because they said they needed
this work. Instead of saying, “I am going to take the
young Chinese women, because they were all young,
20, 22, 25, [to do the jobs].” I was the oldest in the
department.
Mary-Jade (age unknown): They [young Chinese
women] weren’t forced to stand up. They [manage-
ment] did it on purpose.
Angelina: They did it on purpose [and said] “If you
don’t like it, there’s the door”—
Carmen: Because they wanted us to say we were not
capable and they would have said, “OK. Off you go
home.” They didn’t want to fire us, they would have
said, “Well you know what you can do.”
They [previous company] decided that our salaries
were too high, so we were laid off, but the company
is fine, always increasing. . . . What I find the most
difficult is that when you are getting older it starts
getting more and more difficult. Shops are closing
one after another and you have to . . . it took me 9
months before I could find a job. . . . And, even if
you find another job, you end up with lower wages,
by at least $2.50 lower per hour.
These older workers stood up on the job for 2
weeks, and then the company closed down. The fo-
cus group participants believed that management
closed the company when they realized that having
the older workers stand at work would not deter
them from their jobs. In this situation, the easiest and
most profitable scenario for owners was to keep their
company open, if at the same time, they could also
eliminate their older, highly paid workers. However,
because these were unionized workers they could
not easily be fired. As a result, it seemed that owners
attempted to make the working conditions difficult
for older workers so that they would quit their jobs
without being forced out. And the owners used ageist
beliefs about the relationship between stamina, frailty,
Similar sentiments were voiced in another focus
group. As Maralisa (displaced, aged 56) said, “They
always look for somebody younger.” Theresa (dis-
placed, age unknown) responded, “For example: You
go somewhere; they ask your age, and after, they say,
ah, ah. For the application, they say yes; then, after
they say ah, no, no, no. We have no work. Come
back next week. We’ll see, maybe.”
In response to our queries about age discrimina-
tion in the search for work, Leigh (displaced, aged
Vol. 41, No. 1, 2001
119

60) suggested that older workers were disadvantaged
because “If older it costs. And you are slowed down.
And the company doesn’t like this.” Thus, older
workers interpreted their search for work as one that
was laden with ageism that resulted in discrimina-
tion. They believed that employers wanted to hire
young workers, either because they believed that
they could pay them lower wages or because they
felt that older workers’ productivity had declined.
Many believed that they were faced with a para-
dox in being too old to find work yet too young to re-
ceive retirement benefits. This paradox translated
into worries about current financial difficulties and
questions regarding how they would pay for their re-
tirement. These issues are illustrated in following dis-
cussion:
defaults. The different points of focus in this conversa-
tion may be based on age. For instance, on the surface
it appeared as if José and France were affected in simi-
lar ways by a company closure. However, because
France was 63 years old and José was aged 53, their fi-
nancial options were quite different. France could ap-
ply for reduced state and Union pensions, whereas
José had to either find work (a difficult endeavor in the
current economic climate) or go on welfare. Thus, the
seemingly age-neutral strategy of closing a business
has different structural consequences for the workers
affected by it depending on their age. Younger work-
ers do not have to fight ageism in their search for
work, the oldest workers have the option of retiring,
and those in the middle must confront age discrimina-
tion in hiring practices.
José (aged 53): We have to accept it [factories closing
and having to take work at lower pay] but it’s diffi-
cult. Like me, I started very young and it’s been a lot
of years. I’ve been in the union for quite a long time,
and I mean I have nothing. I’m facing nothing, noth-
ing. I’m still too young for early retirement. . . .
You’ve been working for 25 years, with all your
heart, all your soul. You gave up your health and you
fall face to face with nothing there.
Discussion and Conclusions
Ageism in Garment Work: Behavior and Ideology
In the introductory sections of this article we iden-
tified two components of ageism—ideology and be-
havior. Ageist attitudes, values, and beliefs that make
up the ideological dimension of ageism need not be
harmful to individuals, but this dimension often tran-
spires into ageist behavior that is discriminatory.
Drawing on a case study of garment workers in Mon-
treal, we document how ageism is manifested at the
ideological level of attitudes and stereotypes con-
trasting older and younger workers, and how it is
manifested behaviorally as age discrimination. We
argue that attitudes and behavior have related but in-
dependent impacts in structuring people’s lives.
France (aged 63): We even lost a lot of weeks of sal-
ary, vacations—
José: We lost part of our early retirement [pension
contributions].
France: Yes, we gave our work and we lost it all.
Regarding ageist ideology, workers in the Mon-
treal garment industry, most of whom are women,
see their fate as tied to and affected by ageism. They
believe that their work experience, which they view
as one of the positive aspects of aging, is discounted
by owners and managers, who focus instead on real
or putative age-related declines in stamina and dex-
terity. To some extent, the workers accept the nega-
tive stereotypes held by the owners and managers,
and negative stereotypes about dexterity and produc-
tivity appear to be produced and reproduced by
older workers themselves. Older workers also counter
that age and experience bring greater skill, fewer mis-
takes, and the ability to help younger workers. How-
ever, the fact that older workers feel the need to de-
fend their work skills serves to reinforce the very
ageist ideology that older workers try to guard against.
With respect to age discrimination, owners and
managers do not appear to be overtly ageist. Rather,
they make decisions about their workers and the
work setting that are based largely on structural fac-
tors other than the age of the workers. For example,
many of them want to be rid of older, unionized
workers because they command higher wages than
younger, nonunionized employees. The issue for them
is cost reduction, and age is implicated only indi-
rectly in their reasoning. Hence, the focus in the po-
litical economy of aging tradition on class relations is
important within the context of paid garment work.
José: We lost everything, there were people laid off.
There were people who had so many weeks per year
they had worked. We got nothing like it.
France: We didn’t receive a notice. One day, you
went home, and the next day, the doors were closed.
There were some who received notices—we didn’t
get any notice. And we lost weeks of salary and va-
cation. Our vacations, they didn’t send them to the
Joint Commission.
José: There are a lot amounts lost. We lost money—
France: It [the company] still exists.
José: It’s difficult because they changed the name,
they changed the company, but the name is still
there. They took three, four girls and they went.
This discussion illustrates how the industry practice
of closing and then reopening a shop was experienced
by the workers themselves. After years of working in
the industry, José and France believed that, in the end,
they were treated unfairly because of the many losses
they faced when their company closed down. José
was concerned about her current and future financial
security, whereas France was more concerned with
immediate losses based on the company’s payment
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However, owners and managers do make use of
age, including stereotypical and negative images of
the older worker, as a legitimation for attempts to ex-
clude or discourage older workers from employment.
They do not organize the work routines so as to facil-
itate the adaptation of older workers to waning dex-
terity or physical strength. Instead, they contract out
the easy jobs, relying on the experience of the older
employees for the more difficult work but not adapt-
ing the pace or demands of the work. Real or sup-
posed age-related declines in dexterity and physical
ability become rationales to force or induce older
workers to leave employment. When inducements
fail, owners sometimes close the plants, reopening
them soon after with younger, cheaper workers. In
the end, seemingly age-neutral strategies of cost re-
duction become systems of inequality in which age is
implicated and older workers are placed at a height-
ened disadvantage relative to younger workers. In
support of Laws’s (1995) argument, this suggests that
there is something unique about age relations that
creates disadvantage and must be considered as in-
tersecting with issues of class.
Whereas negative stereotypes about older workers,
and ageist attitudes toward them, undoubtedly play a
part in the fact that older displaced workers almost
never return to employment and are thus discriminated
against, the economic calculations of owners and man-
agers play a role as well. The severe economic pres-
sures experienced by the Montreal garment industry
cannot be ignored. The industry is in decline, making
bankruptcies a more acceptable strategy and encourag-
ing the use of contract labor, which is done for the
most part by younger, nonunionized, immigrant work-
ers. These managerial strategies produce casualties no
less severe than the casualties that follow from restruc-
turing through the downsizing that is found in less mar-
ginal sectors of the economy, but the limited human
capital of garment workers—their gender, their limited
education, their ethnicity, and their low social class po-
sition—likely intersects with their age to adversely af-
fect these marginalized players in the world economy.
In this article we have focused on the social pro-
cesses through which age becomes relevant in the
lives of garment workers and in doing so have shown
how age relations shape productive work relations.
In discussing their experiences, workers actively con-
struct age categories and place people into them on
the basis of their own and other workers’ chronologi-
cal ages. As a result of such categorization, a struc-
ture of age relations is reproduced within garment
industry work. Older workers are thought to be less
powerful and less productive than younger workers,
and alternatively, older workers are thought to have
more experience, be more responsible, and make
fewer mistakes in their work than younger workers.
Regardless of whether any of these views are “true,”
the fact that they appear in the discourse of the work-
ers suggests that age is a potential basis of division
and conflict among the working class and thus a
threat to working class solidarity.
However, we do not believe that social structural
forces of age relations, class relations, or other bases of
difference are located outside of the actions of individ-
uals. Although properties of social structural relations
constrain and limit the agency of the individual, they
never do so completely. Older workers in the Mon-
treal garment industry do not experience fates that are
inexorably shaped by external forces. They experience
enormous constraints but they nevertheless make
choices and act strategically in terms of the options
they see available to them. Indeed, older workers resist
owners’ and managers’ attempts at using their “old
age” as an intimidation tactic or threat. But this agency
is deeply embedded in social structure, of which age
structuring processes constitute one dimension. Indi-
viduals act within the structure of age relations to both
reinforce and challenge it (see Giddens, 1993).
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Understanding Ageism: Structured Age Relations and
Individual Action
Clearly, ageism does not function in any simple
way to structure work relations. How then do we ex-
plain the ageist views and behavior that are present
within the garment industry in Montreal? Our theo-
retical approach encompasses a recognition of struc-
tured age relations and individual action. The re-
search presented here suggests that age relations
shape both the ideological and behavioral compo-
nents of ageism within garment work. At an ideologi-
cal level age relations organize and regulate the atti-
tudes that workers have about their own and younger
peoples’ work. Older workers situate their discussion
within their own work experiences but frame them
around widely held beliefs about the productivity of
older workers. At a behavioral level, owners use both
class relations and age relations to exclude and elim-
inate workers from employment opportunities.
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Received April 18, 2000
Accepted June 19, 2000
Decision Editor: Laurence G. Branch, PhD
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