In the larger enterprises older men are proverbially less speculative, more conservative, less venturesome than the young.

American business would, perhaps, not suffer if a larger admixture of these qualities were found in all the walks of commerce and business.
The fact that when a man is at the head of a concern, large or small, he is valued usually more at sixty-five than at thirty-five, and the further fact that thirty-five is often the dead-line for admission to the lower ranks of the same industry or commercial position, is a proof that this age-limit of the worker in lower position is not one of definite knowledge of actual incapacity after forty years of age but rather due to other conditions.

Those conditions are, first and foremost, the easier management of younger than of older subordinates.
It is hard for many men to "order about," in peremptory fashion, a man older than themselves, and few men can command without abruptness or sharp orders.

It is still harder for most men to order about as office assistant or clerk or secretary a woman older than themselves.

And fewer men can assume a respectful yet commanding attitude toward women than can do so toward men in their employ.