Even if a young person can hold as information as an older person does, I bet it's not as nuanced. There's a huge difference between seeing generations of people age and seeing the way culture moves across the internet. Socio-cultural shifts are not the same as generational, age shifts. And growing up in an economy of technological boom and prosperity is not the norm either.
People would benefit just from having the experience from a different perspective of how to observe the world, interpret information, and relate to it. I view my generation as one that is intrinsically linked with technology, and I think it blinds us to a lot of assumptions as to how we think the world functions, and I think there is a lot of stuff we haven't existed long enough to observe and become aware of. It's like an invisible divide. I don't know how much I take for granted about my perspective, and I don't know how much others take for theirs, but I know that often, I am rarely correct in understanding how other people think, and I know often, that there is so much more variance that exists, that doesn't get translated through numbers and words. It's like it disappears, but it affects the way one navigates and establishes their own existence.
Even thinking in terms of how a computer 'thinks' versus how people 'irrationally' think is a ridiculous and absurd irony. Judgment is overrated.
You make it sound as if it's a 20-something's fault for getting hired.
What do you think the median age of managers, HR employees, and executives are? They're the ones doing the hiring.
Software engineering employees tend to have a lot more say in hiring than in other fields. I have not participated in a single interview process, on either side, where a single engineer expressing doubt about a candidate would not at least be seriously listened to and discussed. And sure, none of them are going to say right-out, "This guy's old!" But, if they are truly discriminatory, they will consistently find other things wrong with those candidates and overplay issues that they would normally not. And that kind of discrimination will play itself out over time into a skewed distribution of employees.
The sad thing is, they already know it. They just don't care. They think "Oh, that's 15-20 years away, what do I have to worry about? They'll have something sorted out by then..."
They don't realize that the next 10-15 years for them is going to fly by. Ages 1-22 feel like forever. It feels like a lifetime. Unfortunately, age 22-42 is completely different. Those years will fly by.
I have read every scrap of reporting on age discrimination in the Valley that I can find. The idea that my age will be a detriment to me in the coming decade is viscerally real for me.
It is also mind-boggling that age discrimination would be going in this direction. In industries like mfg. and oil and gas, the gray beard is a sign of status. I would not be offended at ALL if I was beaten out of a position by an equal candidate 20 years my senior. I'd be honored to have similar qualifications.
Just a single anecdotal counter-point to your stereotype. "They" covers quite a few people in your comment.