Abstract This article offers an overview of the legal responses to age discrimination in Poland. It explores the system of legal protection before the accession of Poland to the European Union, and looks too at the situation after the implementation of Council Directive 2000/78/EC. It argues that Community law has enhanced protection against age discrimination significantly, but that legislation remains far from perfect, and that the effective eradication of this form of discrimination in Poland is impeded by a range of difficulties typically found in countries with a Communist past.