Proclamation 4199—National Employ the Older Worker Week

The employment of men and women who are 45 years of age and over is an important objective—not only for those directly involved, but for our entire country. For their energies, their talents, and their experience are a national resource of tremendous value which is not now being fully utilized.

There are many barriers hampering middle-aged and older Americans in continuing as productive and useful participants in the society and in the work force. This Administration is committed to overcoming these barriers.

In an expanding economy such as ours the single most effective response to the employment problems of older workers will come from the understanding and voluntary cooperation of employers in both the private and public sectors.

To encourage such cooperative efforts, the Congress, by House Joint Resolution 334, has requested the President to issue a proclamation designating the second full calendar week in March of 1973 as National Employ the Older Worker Week.

Now, Therefore, I, Richard Nixon, President of the United States of America, do hereby designate the week beginning March 11, 1973, as National Employ the Older Worker Week. I am pleased to join with the Congress in urging all employers to consider the skills and qualifications of those men and women 45 years of age and older who are unemployed or underemployed and who are able and willing to work.

I am also asking the Secretary of Labor to see to it that those public officials at national, State, and local levels who provide job placement, counseling, training, and retraining services accelerate their efforts to help older workers to find suitable jobs and training opportunities. We must not only concentrate on these efforts during this week but sustain them at high level throughout the year.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this fifteenth day of March, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred seventy-three, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred ninety-seventh.

RICHARD NIXON