Every employer says they hire on merit. The hiring data says something more specific: some sectors take on older workers routinely, and others almost never do, and the difference has less to do with attitude than with how those industries are structured.
The pattern is worth knowing, because applying into a sector that structurally does not hire your age band is a slow way to lose confidence.
Where experience is priced in
Sectors that hire older workers readily tend to share one trait: the cost of a mistake is high, and experience visibly reduces it. Healthcare, skilled trades, logistics coordination, compliance, facilities management and technical field service all fall here.
In these roles a candidate who has already seen the failure modes is cheaper than one who has not, and employers know it. Grey hair reads as risk reduction.
Public sector and large regulated employers also tend to be more consistent, partly because their hiring is more procedural and leaves less room for a manager's instinct about 'fit'.
Where it is harder
The difficult sectors are those where pay scales are tied tightly to years-since-graduation, or where the culture is built around long hours from people without dependants. Early-stage technology companies and parts of media and advertising are the usual examples.
This is not universal and it is not lawful when it becomes explicit, but it is real enough that it should inform where effort goes.
What changes the outcome
Two things move the needle more than any CV formatting advice. The first is applying to organisations large enough to have a formal hiring process, where a single manager's bias carries less weight.
The second is being specific about recent capability rather than total years. 'Thirty years in the industry' invites the wrong inference. 'Ran the site's compliance audit last year' does not.
The aim is not to disguise experience. It is to stop a number standing in for what you can actually do.