English Explanatory Dictionary

silver ceiling

English dictionary entry

Meanings

noun
  1. An informal (and often unacknowledged) barrier to promotion or advancement, in employment and elsewhere, for middle-aged and elderly people.

Word forms

silver ceiling

Etymology

silver (suggesting the gray hair characteristic of advanced age) + ceiling (suggesting a barrier to upward advancement); modeled on glass ceiling, the first of such figurative ceiling terms.

Related words

ageism
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