
At what age does ageism start to affect opportunities for software engineers? - fauria
https://www.quora.com/At-what-age-does-ageism-start-to-affect-opportunities-for-software-engineers?share=1
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tutufan
At 53, it hasn't had much effect on me as far as I can tell. The first time I
noticed was at about 45, where a SV startup that seemed extremely enthusiastic
nope'd after seeing me on Skype.

IMO, there's just not much to be done about it. My skills are about as good as
they ever were, and my long experience can be extremely useful. Some employers
will hire that and some won't.

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hn_user2
I always say that the places that nope out after seeing my age, are definitely
places where I wouldn't want to work when I look at work/life balance, etc.

I think the truth is, it really isn't a good fit. These places want young
people because they want that kid to stay all night--maybe with a break with
the gang for some beers before going back to work.

No thanks.

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TheCowboy
I just don't think this is a convincing argument from a philosophical
standpoint, but it is a common argument. If we apply it in other situations,
"a young black man wouldn't want to work for a company that doesn't want to
hire young black men any way". It is true on the surface. Nobody wants to be
where they aren't wanted for non-negative traits they cannot change.

When a problem is rare enough, and people affected have other options, it is a
reasonable pragmatic stance. Let the isolated business owner, who treats it as
a personal social club, be less successful.

It is not good for society if these injustices proliferate. Economic
imbalances result favoring arbitrary traits that don't increase the wealth of
society. Innovation is inhibited, labor market inefficiencies result. People
can't change careers as easily and adapt to technological progress.

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tutufan
At a societal level, I'd prefer that companies didn't act irrationally. (I
don't believe in justice _per se_.)

But at an individual level, you have to play the cards you are dealt. There is
a huge amount of noise in the system, but play them as well as you can.

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natch
Age 9 or so when they start being able to code. For a while, many people think
they are too young to be employed.

Then after you are 35 or so, many younger people think you are "old."

From what I've seen, and yes saying this sounds ageist, ageism is mostly a
problem created by young people.

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elliotec
I live in Salt Lake City, and I really don't see it much here. I am younger
than the average age by quite a bit (so take this with heaps of salt), but at
my company we have programmers in their 60's and 70's.

Maybe some of the more wannabe SV type startups with 100x more sales bros than
devs might be more ageist, but generally in the enterprise or consulting world
(and even education) where I've spent my time, it seems most older developers
are respected for their experience.

I do get nervous about this too though, because of what I hear elsewhere in
the industry. It also seems tough to not cap out at a ceiling very early on in
the career if you're not climbing some ladder.

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colanderman
18\. Until you're in your 30s, it can be hard to get a salary that matches
your abilities, and peers/management that respects your talent. Sometimes it's
hard for them to accept that you're both the youngest dev on the team _and_
the only one who has any goddamned clue how TCP works.

For me this thankfully is in hindsight. I am now lucky to (a) be employed at a
company which cultivates a culture of respect for technical ability which
spans an age range of 40+ years, and (b) be 31 years old.

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angryasian
Sadly if you aren't on a management tract by 40 you're opportunities will be
come less and less. Theres only so many Sr Engineers or Architects a company
needs. For some reason companies don't mind hiring a hand full of managers for
every one Sr engineer. From startups to big companies I've seen this to be
true. Just throw a bunch of younger engineers at problems and solutions that
are designed by one or two sr engineers.

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Karrot_Kream
Sometimes I feel like software is an army of the blind leading the blind.

Senior Engineers with 3 years of experience, that enter management the moment
they can score 5 years of experience, combined with an attitude that Senior
Engineers/Architects are too expensive, mean that a bunch of slightly
experienced engineers lead teams of absolutely inexperienced engineers. And
these green teams lead death marches to creating Javascript apps to get the
next cloud-mobile-web-social _disruption_.

No wonder nobody wants to go into computer science.

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api
It depends, and it depends on where you are. I've heard it's bad in the Valley
but I haven't seen it elsewhere so much.

The biggest advice I give to programmers who are getting older and want to
stay programmers is: don't let you skills atrophy, and always keep learning
new technologies. If you do those things you're probably fine.

Older programmers can sometimes command a premium since if they're good
they'll have a tremendous amount of very esoteric knowledge and a lot of
experience.

