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New Evidence of Age Bias in Hiring, and a Push to Fight It
261–270 of 451 posts
Re: New Evidence of Age Bias in Hiring, and a Push to Fight It
#262I suspect it is a deep seated human tendency to look up to and defer to the experience of those who are older than you (parents, community elders), so people are naturally uncomfortable with "senior underlings". Junior bosses will inevitably feel their decisions and position threatened by people older than them, especially in more general settings.
Throw in the conflation of skill with seniority, leading to an expectation of adjusting wage to age (not skill), our culture's infatuation with youth and the reliance on heuristics to save time and you have a situation highly unsuited to our present job-hopping lifestyles. Finding a job is more about "who you know, not what you know", which just makes things worse since age groups tend to cluster. This then gets explained as "cultural fit".
IME HR is all about risk avoidance. HR is not about finding the best candidate, it is concerned about finding the safest. The older folk may be the best, but they are not the safest, because they tend to have empty patches in their resume and the soft skills like wisdom, communication skills, tend not to be expressible in resume form.
It's never easy going against ingrained norms, especially when they are held by other people. Until the current millenial tech companies hit middle age, I don't see things changing much. Business opportunity?
Re: New Evidence of Age Bias in Hiring, and a Push to Fight It
#263Earlier quoted context omitted.
None. I don’t live on the West Coast and that seems to be mostly a west coast thing. According to all of the local salary surveys and anecdotal information that I’m getting from recruiters, former managers, and former coworkers, I’m slightly on the right side of the bell curve for architect/principal engineer, etc. Not bragging, the salary and cost of living is well below the west coast. My last job where I thought I…
Interesting. What region do you live in, and how do you think your bottom line compares to what you’d see in a comparable role in the Bay Area? I’m not really architect / principal level just yet (probably 3-5 years of continuous improvement from that I would say), but I feel like I’m just barely getting ahead as a senior making $200k paying $2300/month in rent with no hope to buy and about a 40-60 minute commute (de…
Orlando, FL. Same cost as Atlanta with a 15 min commute and places like disney/seaworld/etc
Re: New Evidence of Age Bias in Hiring, and a Push to Fight It
#264What about older junior developers?
I am 39yo, but I do not relate with these stories from people with 20+ years of experience in tech. I am a frontend developer for two years only, moving to Los Angeles just now and looking for a job.
Anyone would like to comment if my age and my lack of experience programming will compound and make extra hard for me to get a job?
Re: New Evidence of Age Bias in Hiring, and a Push to Fight It
#265Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thanks, you've provided some great insights here - and appreciated those links. Will buy that O'Reilly book! Mid 40s myself, stayed in one tech stack for too long but have been redeeming myself in the past few years with .net core, AWS, Docker and trying to get into React. I find myself struggling most with the front end bits, but it's just a question of staying with it. Have always loved tech, and highly passionate…
My pleasure! One thing that I'd like to mention that I didn't before is that the interview process can be taxing, draining, and it can be an emotional roller-coaster. Try to stay positive and keep at it. Good things will come!
Cheers. I'm a FTE presently, but have always got to look forward so whilst no immediate pressure I've learned that there's really no resting on one's laurels.
And yes can confirm that when I had to go through the process, and was less prepared, it was certainly very draining. So spending time learning/staying on top of things in peace time will certainly help during "war". :)
Staying physically healthy, lifting weights etc is another thing that hasn't been raised so far, so would just like to put that in. Can always adjust perception through that, and also it is something we truly need to be doing now that we're getting older. It also helps for mental health.
Re: New Evidence of Age Bias in Hiring, and a Push to Fight It
#266Earlier quoted context omitted.
Interesting. What region do you live in, and how do you think your bottom line compares to what you’d see in a comparable role in the Bay Area? I’m not really architect / principal level just yet (probably 3-5 years of continuous improvement from that I would say), but I feel like I’m just barely getting ahead as a senior making $200k paying $2300/month in rent with no hope to buy and about a 40-60 minute commute (de…
Excuse me, but at $200k you're making $100k net so about $8k per month. With rent at $2.3k, you should be able to save enough to buy something at some point, no? Or at least you could rent something more expensive, closer to work?
Maybe not in the Bay Area. But certainly could save for something elsewhere.
Re: New Evidence of Age Bias in Hiring, and a Push to Fight It
#267Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm sure the actions of a person who would buy and set up a specialized device to block ads are not representative of the general population so I (and probably any other content producer) are not going to optimize for that use-case, though I do appreciate your sharing.
It may be that "regular" people are more willing to have a dozen different media subscriptions for various sites, but I don't think that's a safe assumption.
I definitely agree that that's unlikely to be true. However a guaranteed failing business model is a "no one pays" model.
No ads. No membership. Content for free. Doesn't work.
Re: New Evidence of Age Bias in Hiring, and a Push to Fight It
#268Earlier quoted context omitted.
Interesting. What region do you live in, and how do you think your bottom line compares to what you’d see in a comparable role in the Bay Area? I’m not really architect / principal level just yet (probably 3-5 years of continuous improvement from that I would say), but I feel like I’m just barely getting ahead as a senior making $200k paying $2300/month in rent with no hope to buy and about a 40-60 minute commute (de…
Excuse me, but at $200k you're making $100k net so about $8k per month. With rent at $2.3k, you should be able to save enough to buy something at some point, no? Or at least you could rent something more expensive, closer to work?
Two words: Bay Area. There really is no possibility for me to afford a ~$1M house anytime soon, and renting significantly closer to work (as in a 30 minute public transportation commute) would cost me at least double what I pay now.
Re: New Evidence of Age Bias in Hiring, and a Push to Fight It
#269Can someone tell me where the older software engineers in the Bay Area have gone? I recently moved into the software industry (after years in the telecom industry), and the lack of older software engineers is disconcerting in a Soylent Green type of way. I guess some have moved into management, and others have made enough money to retire, or they've moved somewhere with better value than the Bay Area. They're likely…
Someone who is over 40 today would have gotten their start in the late 90's around the time of the first Internet boom. The number of software engineering positions since then has exploded. Based on numbers on the Bureau of Labor and Statistics website it seems like they are roughly doubling each decade. The main source of new engineers is new graduates. That, coupled with the fact that people move into management, and leave the field, retire early is going to skew the workforce to the younger side regardless of any age discrimination.
Re: New Evidence of Age Bias in Hiring, and a Push to Fight It
#270Earlier quoted context omitted.
Interesting. What region do you live in, and how do you think your bottom line compares to what you’d see in a comparable role in the Bay Area? I’m not really architect / principal level just yet (probably 3-5 years of continuous improvement from that I would say), but I feel like I’m just barely getting ahead as a senior making $200k paying $2300/month in rent with no hope to buy and about a 40-60 minute commute (de…
Orlando, FL. Same cost as Atlanta with a 15 min commute and places like disney/seaworld/etc
I have a friend who worked in Orlando. I got a chance to see what life was like in Orlando as a non tourist. It’s a nice place.