Why are companies keen on recruiting “younger” employees?

Employment restrictions must be set in compliance with legal policies and social ethics. To deal with similar issues in the field of labor relations, we should proceed from the standpoint of safeguarding both the autonomy of the employer and the employment rights of workers, and strive to find the most win-win path for both parties in the labor relationship.

According to a report in the Workers' Daily on February 6, during the spring recruitment time, reporters saw on multiple recruitment platforms that some companies set 30 years old as the upper age limit for recruitment, blocking some job seekers. beyond this "age threshold". Some experts said that in the context of declining demographic dividend and intensifying aging, setting an "age threshold" for recruitment is not conducive to the reasonable development and full utilization of human resources, and also damages workers' equal employment rights.

It is the employer’s autonomy to set age limits for job applicants during recruitment. Some companies in special industries can set specific recruitment age conditions due to special requirements of occupations or positions. However, some industrial enterprises that do not have special requirements, general positions and even positions that require the accumulation of experience and skills are also rushing to join the ranks of employment age restrictions, which is obviously beyond the scope of reasonableness and necessity.

Many companies set various thresholds when recruiting employees, which are obviously based on profit considerations. For example, young people have more time and energy to devote to the workplace; hiring fewer female employees can save them from the troubles caused by raising children in corporate employment, thereby reducing management costs; most graduates from "985" and "211" colleges prefer Their knowledge reserves are relatively comprehensive, and they can adapt to job requirements as quickly as possible, reducing corporate training costs, etc. Some companies even put forward additional requirements for employees after they join the company, and they even have the intention of maximizing the company's interests. For example, employees are required to work overtime unconditionally and obey job transfers, and not consider having children within a few years after joining the company. These unilateral restrictions undermine the equality and fairness of labor relations to varying degrees.

Similarly unscientific and unreasonable employment restrictions, in the name of enterprise autonomy in employment, have become popular in some fields and places, exacerbating the job-hunting anxiety of some workers and exceeding legal red lines and ethics. The bottom line is that it has caused unnecessary chaos to the orderly job market, and to a certain extent has become a "stumbling block" to building harmonious labor relations, which must be restrained and regulated.

The exercise of an enterprise's autonomy in employment is not without boundaries. "It can be done without prohibition by law" does not mean that the employer can act indiscriminately. The setting of employment restrictions must comply with legal policies and social ethics. If the red line stipulated in laws and policies is exceeded and the bottom line of social morality is exceeded, the enterprise's employment autonomy will be alienated into an excuse for illegal employment and will be subject to legal sanctions.

In the past, some companies had obvious gender discrimination in recruitment, and they paid a high price after being deemed illegal by the court. With the implementation of the Law on the Protection of Women’s Rights and Interests, more and more people understand that those suspected of employment discrimination on the basis of gender will face administrative penalties and judicial sanctions. Under the constraints of legal policies, gender discrimination that occurred from time to time in the recruitment process in the past has been better managed. Such governance results give us the confidence to solve similar problems.

Drawing red lines and bottom lines for illegal and unreasonable employment restrictions depends on the improvement of the rule of law and the implementation of supervision. Only by continuously refining the content of equal employment rights in relevant laws, clarifying the boundaries of corporate autonomy and rigid requirements for the protection of employees' rights and interests, increasing law enforcement efforts, continuously promoting the creation of harmonious labor relations, and improving the initiative of employers to fulfill their social responsibilities At the same time, we should combine the preferential policies enjoyed by enterprises with the legality and rationality of employment, and implement comprehensive governance to bring the employment behavior of enterprises back to the legal, reasonable and appropriate track.

Employment is the greatest livelihood. In the context of the reality that recruitment difficulties are intertwined with "labor shortages" and there are many structural problems in employment, some companies set arbitrary thresholds for employment. This is no longer a trivial matter between workers and employers, but is related to the protection of workers' rights and interests. It is a major event for the healthy development of related industries and the orderly operation of the economy and society. To deal with similar issues in the field of labor relations, we should start from the standpoint of safeguarding both the autonomy of the employer and the employment rights of workers, and strive to find the most win-win path for both parties in the labor relationship.