Live data from Hacker News

Ageism Haunts Some Tech Workers in the Race to Get Hired

wired.com

211–219 of 219 posts

Re: Ageism Haunts Some Tech Workers in the Race to Get Hired

#211

Ageism is pretty much only talked about when it affects older people. Younger people - broadly millenials and younger - have just had to make piece with the ageism they've faced their entire lives and continue to face. I understand that one day I'll be old too, but my sympathies are limited and it'll be nothing truly new for us when people start dismissing us for being old, since people have been dismissing us for be…

> younger people [...] faced ageism their whole lives. You didn't really read that part through before posting, did you?

Not sure what you mean.

Re: Ageism Haunts Some Tech Workers in the Race to Get Hired

#212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

aka, seemingly boring enterprise software is the place to go. Some of them are actually very good places.

It's a safe and stable place to go. Of course, if everyone wanted safety there wouldn't be so much rush into startups or entertainment industries, especially by young starry-eyed creatives.

Interestingly though.. there is a lot more upside than most folks realize. Look at the execs at some medium sized enterprise software shop - they are making a lot of cash.

Re: Ageism Haunts Some Tech Workers in the Race to Get Hired

#213
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is such a weird take for a young software dev to have - you are uniquely positioned in an intersection of both age and the industry you're in to have faced extremely little ageism. Compared to just about anyone else working their way up and gaining experience elsewhere, you've had it easy. The lack of perspective is staggering. You'd fully deserve that violin played for you later on in your career.

That's just a bunch of empty assertions you're putting forward, you need to back those up with an actual explanation of how you formed those beliefs. You might say most of my comment was just a bunch of assertions, but they were assertions about my own perception of my own experience. I think you have a higher burden to elaborate when you're making assertions about someone else's experience, especially when it contra…

I didn't realise this was an assertion scoring debate rather than just a discussion, but here goes:

* I have experienced what software development was like 25yrs ago, when it also took a lot longer to gain seniority and responsibility.

* I started my career in a different engineering field. I saw a very different ageseniority progression than the quick one in software. In fact that was why I switched to tech even if software was slower back then than now.

The combination of both those was the basis for claiming that young software devs have been in an extraordinarily privileged position in recent years. Do you have any idea what it's like outside software?

You're going to have to make a better case that young software engineers these days experience ageism at a similar level to other professions or time periods. It is now an industry that skews young and quickly discards age. You'd also need to distinguish between lack of experience and just being young to claim it's ageism.

And the age groups you were deriding were the ones that broke down those barriers for younger devs in the first place. Did you consider they would've experienced worse and sought to change it?

Your non specific comment seemed like an extremely self centered view of the wider industry that lacked perspective and contradicted a near universally understood situation. You were the one making the extraordinary claim that needed backup.

Your incredibly broad generalisation got a necessarily broad reply which you're now complaining about just being an empty assertion. You did nothing to elaborate about your experience was - what did you expect? Maybe if you'd been more specific about what you've faced you would've got different answers.

Re: Ageism Haunts Some Tech Workers in the Race to Get Hired

#215
post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>or even just clearly being defensive about ageism. I mean, that makes sense? I would be just as defensive about racism or sexism if the vibe came off in an interview. >They haven't been staying abreast of current changes, and by that I don't mean jumping on the latest fad but rather knowing that the fads exist. I guess it depends on the domain. Sure, I can see web moving fast and the someone who focused on at best J…

The actual technologies matter less, and I'm not talking about "the fundamentals". It's more that they tend to have only been doing the exact small set of things for a long period of time. When I've hired such people much more often than not they struggle to learn, because they're no longer used to learning. And much like I said the prior as a fellow greybeard, I'm saying this as someone who is much more cavalier tha…

Given my experience as someone much younger in industry, I wonder if this is less about them struggling to catch up and more about how no one wants to on board new hires these days. It feels like confounding evidence when suggesting that older people struggle to learn but also job training has been on the decline for a decade or so.

I'm sure older people are more outspoken. I have to dance around to mention that documentation is inadequate. Someone with more experience and opportunities may be more blunt about it.

Re: Ageism Haunts Some Tech Workers in the Race to Get Hired

#216
post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>People in this thread need to ask themselves why they're engaging in age-denialism. Simple: compensation and hiring practices run counter to this notion. If you're most productive in your 20's you should be paid more for that productivity, and years of experience wouldn't be such a mandatory metric. Neither is true in practice. Older people have more expeirence, and get paid more. Policy makers have a median age in…

It's true everywhere. Older people are paid more for no good reason, it's just "the way things are" that you get a raise every year. In a freer market, it wouldn't be the case.

>It's true everywhere.

I just described an industry where it's not. You don't make money playing sports in your 30's. If you still wanna work by that time, you teach others sport, be a newscaster, or sell your brand. They may or may not make millions. It depends on how you sell yourself, but most athletes aren't salesmen.

> In a freer market, it wouldn't be the case.

We're about as free as we're going to get. You can quit or be laid off at anytime and hires in tech get amazing compensation for relatively little experience compared to fields like medicine, law, or accounting.

You're free to enact such a model yourself and see how well it works if you're confident in it. But market forces aren't dumb either.

Re: Ageism Haunts Some Tech Workers in the Race to Get Hired

#219
post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When 3 months of one gig pay for your whole year of expenses - yes its better.

You must live outside the US. In the US If you’re only looking at expenses many full time jobs can get there in 3-6mos too. And not even big tech Sure it’s nice to have the choice to not work between engagements but again you’ll be back to finding the next one

If you bounce from full time to full time with 75% unemployment you are a no-hire many places and almost universally in a downturn. Consulting and contracting is often used to be vague and even pretend you are unsuccessfully looking for contracts a lot of the time precisely because that is the reality for many and more acceptable for many types of employment.
Post reply on HN