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Done with YC: Age Discrimination

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Done with YC: Age Discrimination

#81

Post by grzm »

over50 wrote: post #80
skmurphy wrote: post #2

You should put your contact info in your profile or as a comment in this thread. Others, like myself, would like to contact you.

I just did. I will only reply to messages if it seems a conversation is warranted. I've had the experience on HN and other groups of someone contacting you with something that looks interesting only to identify you and then go away. Not interested in that at all. I hope you understand.

Just a heads-up: for your contact information to appear in your profile, you need to include it in the "about" text area. The "email" field is only visible to moderators.

Re: Done with YC: Age Discrimination

#82

Post by dang »

GradientAscent2 wrote: post #69
dang wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I deleted that sentence because it made my post too long, but since you've quoted it, I'll put it back. I was talking there about the editorial decision surrounding HN launches. That's not related to YC's funding decisions. It's not clear to me what your point is, unless it was simply to mention unconscious bias. Saying that you or anyone would somehow be risking yourself by posting to HN is also a little obscure.

[flagged]

"Names imply age" is an obvious red herring - if you had listed names for that reason, you would have said so and explained the connection.

Yes, we're familiar with your history of creating accounts on HN and also your pattern of race-war trolling and other unsavory stuff.

Re: Done with YC: Age Discrimination

#83

Post by over50 »

cjamesd wrote: post #16

My father-in-law holds degrees from Stanford and Harvard, and has similarly struggled to find a job as he's grown older. When I referred him to an open position at my company, his un-edited resume matched almost perfectly, but the recruiter called him "too operational" -- and obviously had not dug in to who he was. I didn't push it but it seemed that his gray hair visible in his LinkedIn profile was a put off. I can'…

My resume scares and likely confuses most people. Most EE's with 30 years of experience have been EE's their entire career. I hired a guy once out of Intel who had, at the time, devoted ten years to designing nothing but power supplies. I couldn't even ask him to design an embedded MCU board, much less write the code. That's fine, nothing wrong with that.

My case is diametrically opposite. I can design anything and tackle just about any discipline. And my resume shows it.

Back when I was just trying to take a break from entrepreneurship and take a job for a few years I got no callbacks at all. Finally a recruiter took pity on me and opened up.

He said I had two problems. If I was dealing with a small company, one look at my resume and their would fear that I wanted a job to learn their business and become a competitor. And, at a mid to large company, when dealing with a VP or manager making the hiring decision, my resume would make them fear I would be after their job after gaining a foothold. So, he said "Nobody is going to hire you. You have no choice but to stay an entrepreneur or lie.".

Not long after that I landed a nice contract to help get astronauts to the International Space Station. That was fun and interesting...yet I eventually ran into the realty that they were paying 20-somethings about 1/3 (or less) of what I was getting. When my work was done my contract had nowhere to go.

Fuck me.

Re: Done with YC: Age Discrimination

#84

Post by brudgers »

blagie wrote: post #35
paulsutter wrote: post #4

You've got YC one-itis. There are a zillion other places to raise money. Any one funding source says no 98% of the time, it has nothing to do with you. -a 55 year old founder who just raised a $20M Series A

As an older founder, it's easier to raise $20M Series A than as a younger founder. I'm pretty confident I have a much better chance of raising money than I did a decade or two ago. To be specific, I think I would have had almost no chance way back when, and I think I'd probably have better-than-even-odds today, if I tried (which I wouldn't; I'm committed to what I'm doing). However, that doesn't mean places don't age…

My recollection is that $125k came about because when there was more money (and there was at one time) it was enough to tempt a non-trivial number of founders to fight over rather than build a company.

The problem, in so far as what I read on HN, was not three cofounders deciding to take the money and travel the world instead of building the company. The problem was that the founders who were interested in fighting over the money were distributed across many teams.

As for the realism of six months of expenses from $125k, thinking about it those terms is a signal that someone might not be a good fit. If it's a problem, it's a surmountable problem either through work (and luck) or through a willingness to fail.

It's a non-starter for non-startups.

Re: Done with YC: Age Discrimination

#85

Post by void_mint »

whitepaint wrote: post #77
void_mint wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like you've begun sealioning. > Just because, let's say, stats showed they mostly invest in people under 35, does it mean they discriminate people over 35? It's about rates, not just raw numbers. If equal amounts of over 35 and under 35 applicants, and consistently YoY you're taking 90% under 35, very clearly you're discriminating against the over 35 category. > If most of founders they invest in are white, do…

> If equal amounts of over 35 and under 35 applicants, and consistently YoY you're taking 90% under 35 ... Could this scenario happen because of anything else besides discrimination from YC?

It's like any stats question. Depends entirely on your sample. With a reasonably sized sample, no, it really couldn't. Also this is more sealioning.

Re: Done with YC: Age Discrimination

#86

Post by brudgers »

blagie wrote: post #38
the-dude wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to have raised money before almost 20 years ago. That sure must help.

That's precisely why being an older person helps. You have experience under your belt. If you're 55 and have never done anything, that's a strong signal to not invest in you, since you're unlikely to do something now. 20-year-olds are risks. 55-year-old have track records.

Yes. Twenty year olds have unrealized potential. At fifty-five, it is not unfair to call it wasted potential.

Re: Done with YC: Age Discrimination

#87

Post by jimhi »

the-dude wrote: post #54
jimhi wrote: post #21

They generally give feedback on your application. There is likely something with your traction or potential market more than your age. I do agree with you there are some elements that make it harder as you get older. That said: https://techcrunch.com/2009/09/07/when-it-comes-to-founding-... The average age of startup founders is older than the press makes it seem. I talk to people in each new batch of Y Combinator. T…

> They generally give feedback on your application. AFAIK this is absolutely not true.

That’s a shame. I know several founders who email specific partners who have in experience in their industry and they seem to get more personalized rejections

Re: Done with YC: Age Discrimination

#88

Post by over50 »

dang wrote: post #64
whitepaint wrote: post #34

Why is this post getting so many upvotes? "Age discrimination" - based on what?! If I am a vegan and get constantly rejected by YC, should I create a post: "Done with YC: They hate vegans"? I expect much better from HN. What the hell.

It's getting upvotes because indignation + sensationalism always gets the most upvotes (this is the weakness of the upvoting system [1]), plus the meta aspect is a force multiplier. Also age discrimination is a perennially hot topic here. It's also getting a lot of flags, which is why the post is not on HN's front page. Just in case anyone is wondering, there's no moderation penalty on it. The tug of war between upvo…

Pretty interesting that a YC person would come out and label this "indignation + sensationalism".

It is neither. It's someone (me) sharing an experience and a personal decision while --if you actually read my post-- praising YC for all the good they do.

My only intent is to perhaps shed some light on the plight of older engineers in the technology ecosystem.

Change the subject if you want. I could not care less. How about "Done with YC: A personal perspective".

Frankly, I find your comment insulting.

Re: Done with YC: Age Discrimination

#89

Post by giantg2 »

threatofrain wrote: post #65
CabSauce wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. It feels like they're trying to claim that they were rejected for age... without providing any evidence. They don't want to come out and say it. But by suggesting enough, it's sure implied.

IMO they had enough evidence to provide an implication , and so that's what we have. The implication. The ammunition comes from the fact that YC asks for your age very early in the process. Either that piece of information is relevant and worth asking... or it's not. That YC asks implies they want the info. But personally I don't think that's enough ammo to start a large forum discussion.

I think it's a fair question to ask.

The author also brings up the difficulty in finding a job in the industry as he gets older. There are a number of people on here that have witnessed similar age-related or suspected age-related issues in this industry, to the point that this issue seems to be a common discussion point [1]. It would be different if they were writing a major editorial hit piece without hard facts. Perhaps this question will lead to YC releasing diversity stats and the reasoning behind the age question.

1. https://moguldom.com/9158/coding-while-old-race-and-sex-aren...

Re: Done with YC: Age Discrimination

#90

Post by over50 »

neolog wrote: post #22

> An established bias against solo founders Why is this against older people?

Older engineers are far less likely to be able to team-up with college buddies to go off into startup-land.

Most everyone I know can't drop everything they are doing, their families and responsibilities to launch a startup. Entrepreneurship is very hard. Some of us have lived the life all of our lives. Others have jobs and they would like to keep it that way. Not judging, it's just the way it is.

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