So imo the underlying issue is that software work, unless it rakes in bags of cash, is not respected as a professional field. (Ever see anyone push to "teach kids how to argue a case in court!"? Coding is information age labor. Needs "young muscle" paraphrasing our absent host, Paul G.)
Possibly something has gone wrong if you are chasing programming work after 40 -- channeling society here, relax -- and yet as an older gentleman coder :) I take quiet satisfaction at the self destructive behavior of the young filters poo pooing "experience". 40 rolls over before you know it. Ding.
Also, in my experience, younger employees are more prone to leaving after a couple of years, because they want to see what else is out there. Whereas older employees tend to stay longer (have already seen many different places).
That being said, people with kids do typically have stricter schedules (like picking up kids from daycare) than people without kids.
Interesting point on the staying longer. The amount of time you sink into training a person on your system / codebase / company etc you're not getting back. People generally only start to become productive after a couple of months anyway.
(Edited: you said it was a pro)
It's really frustrating that parents bring their sick kids to school, and even sick teachers show up to teach because they can't afford to take the time off (apparently). This winter was brutal, I've pretty much spent all of my vacation time just taking care of my family.
Obviously this is just an anecdote but I suspect that many parents are either taking a lot of time off, or just dropping their sick kids off at school.
I had a go at her, because I'm asthmatic. Someone brought a cold into my previous job, and I spent six months with the symptoms of it (really). Another time, someone brought a cold in that hit my asthma so bad that I needed a break after rolling over in bed. My doctor nearly hospitalized me over that - apparently my airways were really narrow.
The other woman from the marketing team jumped in, explaining that she doesn't usually get the cold, but takes the disease home on her hands and clothes, her young kids pick it up, and then she ends up spending a month off looking after them, using all her vacation time just like you did. After all her kids have been sick with it, she'll get it, and she doesn't have any vacation or sick days left.
In the end, it turned out that the hero who never let a "minor illness" get in the way hadn't thought about anybody else catching it.
When there are big age differences, there are natural tendencies towards aggressive prove-yourself competition or slightly compliant deference. These are probably built into the primate minds that we all have.
True peer relationships of any kind are much rarer across decades than between people of similar ages. And there are good reasons for that - not least the way that different decades tend to have different life challenges.
So I think discussions about the merits - or not - of older people are beside the point. If most people in an office are in their 20s, hiring someone in their 50s as a peer is going to be pretty awkward for everyone.
Of course this isn't how it should be. But - no matter what the law says - it's not very realistic to pretend it isn't an issue.
The solution, if there is one, is to deliberately create a polyculture of diversity of all kinds. Hire people of all ages, cultures, genders, and backgrounds. Dammit. Then everyone gets to be different, and the culture has the potential to be a lot less linear.
But SV isn't so interested in that. Until mostly white/asian bright shiny people in their 20s stop beaming enthusiastically out of "About us" pages - extra points for a group shot - SV will continue to be a monoculture, and a lot of practical talent and experience from outside the bubble will continue to be wasted.
At almost 50 the desire to spend 8 hours a day with 20-30 year olds, encouraging enthusiasms, persevering in mentoring and then learning/acceptance of new ideas/tools, being persuasive about experiences in project scope/direction and contributing as part of a growing creative team effort is exhausting.
Not to mention the older you get in this industry you see a lot of reinvention/progress the 'wrong way' (or blatant ripoffs done for profit) which you just become opinionated about.
- Culture issues, like not wanting to go to off work events, and would rather spend time with family. I agree that these types of things should happen on work hours. This may be related to being exploited, but a lot of culture seems to reinforce the exploitation of the workers. Like work hard, be frugal, do more with less, and don't complain about sexual harassment.
- Employees being basically too smart. Both in terms of knowing when management might be leading them down a boondoggle (which seems like it would be a good thing, if the company cared, but a bad thing for an egotistical manager).
- Employees are harder to exploit. Well I think that's good for everyone. If your business model is all about exploiting your employees you've got bigger problems. I'm not going to make any mentions of car hailing services here. ;)
It does seem like a lot of the SV mentality under the hood is to exploit your employees though, as much as possible, and pay them as little as you can. It's only the competition that will take them somewhere else to be exploited for slightly more money.
Looking at this from a business case, having a smart person notify you when you're getting into the swamp sounds like a positive thing. Especially if they've been in the muck before. Throwing away weeks/months of work is pretty common, and a huge source of wasted resources.