Employees more giving to co-workers than boss

Did you get your boss a holiday gift?

Most of us said we were more likely to bestow baubles on co-workers instead of managers, according to a recent poll.

Only about a fifth of workers, 22 percent, said they’d get the boss anything. For those who did feel kindly enough to the boss to gift, the average expenditure was $47, down $4 from last year.

More women (28 percent) than men (16 percent) said they planned to give gifts to the boss, which was in line with the 2002 survey.

Co-workers were expected to fare better this holiday season. The Maritz Poll found that 37 percent of Americans planned to give their co-workers a gift, up slightly from 35 percent last year. The average outlay will be $77, down from $90 last year.

The October telephone poll involved 941 adults selected randomly.

Workplace

Weak economy cited for age discrimination

Corporate folks call it the “gray ceiling,” the career advancement barrier many older workers face in a work world seemingly dominated by the young.

With a still-tight labor market and several years of management-layer culling by employers, finding a new job can be downright brutal for older workers.

A recent survey of nearly 300 executives found that 72 percent believe age discrimination in the workplace has increased during the past five years. Most of them, 90 percent, blame that on the weak economy and mass job cutting by many big companies.

Sixty-five percent said they had encountered age discrimination in a job search, up from 58 percent in a similar 2001 poll. Nearly three-fourths of those, 73 percent, said they were unable to overcome the interviewer’s concerns regarding age.

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