> The 50 year olds who complain are the ones that offer no value and have essentially 1 year of experience doing the same thing (badly) for 30 years.

Google Settles Age-Bias Lawsuit for Undisclosed Amount

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-10-05/google-se...

IBM targeted old people for lawyoffs

https://features.propublica.org/ibm/ibm-age-discrimination-a...

Intel accused of age discrimination

https://www.theverge.com/2018/5/28/17401892/intel-age-discri...

There seems to be a pattern here.

+1

You're probably a young'n. This is what everybody thinks until they hit the point in their life where they realize there is more to life than just work (family, friends, hobbies, etc). You'll be complaining soon enough.

In some sense, that isn’t age discrimination by the employer, but you no longer being willing to be exploited.

It would be age discrimination if employers wouldn’t even invite you for an interview, thinking “(s)he’s 50, so (s)he must be wise enough not to fall for the crap story we tell the gullible”.

As long as there are employers where work-life balance is a better match with what you want out of life, I wouldn’t worry about it. And I think there are, certainly in Europe.

Wow, account age dick measuring... didn't think I'd see this on HN.

Also, what does account age have to do with actual age (which is what we're talking about here)?

Are you implying that the age of your HN account relates in any way to your age? Someone who is sub-30 could have a 2008 account.

That's a pretty condescending answer and pretending age discrimination isn't real doesn't help anything.

I'm pretty sure you don't understand how ageism works. Or racism, sexism or any other 'ism for that matter. Because based on your logic, these problems don't exist anymore in the job marketplace.

Yep, it's far more insidious than just "it's a fairly-land meritocracy" that you believe when you're younger. I have been responsible for hiring a lot of people, and I catch myself judging older candidates before they've said anything: and I'm an old bastard myself!

Precisely. I'm more valuable than someone with 10 years of experience. I produce working code faster (even if I don't work as many hours). I produce better designs. I produce fewer bugs. I'm worth more.

If you are trying to hire me, and you want to pay me like I have 10 years of experience rather than like I have 30, you just selected yourself out as a candidate for my services.

I will disagree with the parent on one thing: It can take a while to find a new job - months instead of weeks. The market for people like me is kind of thin. On the other hand, the supply is thin, too. If you need someone like me, you don't just want to hire two 3-to-5-years people to try to replace me.

And to answer part of the original question: I'm in embedded systems. I don't know if my answers work in web programming.

I think modern embedded systems has a bias built in. To be productive, you have to be proficient in a _LOT_ of topics, many of which are not easy to come by experience wise. This tends to bias towards high experience.

Although what you say is mean. It is somewhat true. A lot of older people stay at one company because of stability. When it comes time to switch, because they've spent their 40s in one company, they haven't gained new skills and they get bad at interviewing.

Essentially what happens is you have a senior title but your skills have languished to the point where you are essentially a junior with expert knowledge about something that's obsolete. That and your mind deteriorates somewhat when you are older if you don't keep exercising it.

I think the fix is to bounce around to many companies, constantly even in your 40s as if you were in your 20s. You lose the stability but you maintain a fresh skillset.

Young people take note! I know many successful older SW engineers and they all have done this.

The other option is to get into management.

>> The 50 year olds who complain are the ones that offer no value

So by your logic, anyone who is 50 or older - that complains - has no value? Real robust rating system you have there kiddo!

Reread the comment. You can be any age and provide value. You can be any age and NOT provide value.