Age Discrimination in Silicon Valley
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Age Discrimination in Silicon Valley
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Re: Age Discrimination in Silicon Valley
#2Well there goes another person who is "offended". Is there age discrimination? Possibly, but at my workplace there are a lot of slackers and you guessed it, they're usually (emphasis on "usually", stop trolling) older, paper pushers, "Let's have a meeting to talk about changing a line of code" people, etc. Needless to say, I work in a big company.
The best way to avoid discrimination of any kind is to continuously update your skills (technical, social, inter-personal etc.). If you have nothing to show for working X number of years, then why would people hire you? They'd rather have someone who can put in an insane amount of hours. I'm not supporting companies who do this, but I'm rather stating the stark reality of Silicon Valley. It's unfortunate, but it is what it is.
Edit: I should've expected these responses; I've said explicitly I do not support this. But at the same time instead of complaining, invest in your skill set.
Re: Age Discrimination in Silicon Valley
#3It seems equally likely age isn't included because widespread discrimination based on age hasn't been a historical norm (and arguably isn't now) the way discrimination based on race, ethnicity, religion etc. has. One "high level google employee" declining to answer such a loaded question in a social/unofficial context is definitely not a strong indictment of their culture.
There could be something to this (younger workers don't have families, work longer, cheaper, fresher skills, to rehash some common points), but this article feels really contrived.
Re: Age Discrimination in Silicon Valley
#4It's worth remembering that many other industries have the opposite problem. Lots of the best jobs being occupied by baby boomers who are taking longer to retire, leading to a lack of opportunity for younger people to get on the ladder.
So we have a large number of smart younger people who are underemployed, are google etc simply innovating by exploiting this undertapped talent pool?
Re: Age Discrimination in Silicon Valley
#5Well there goes another person who is "offended". Is there age discrimination? Possibly, but at my workplace there are a lot of slackers and you guessed it, they're usually (emphasis on "usually", stop trolling) older, paper pushers, "Let's have a meeting to talk about changing a line of code" people, etc. Needless to say, I work in a big company. The best way to avoid discrimination of any kind is to continuously up…
And conversely, I've worked on teams where most of the developers were "inexperienced" and didn't have the skills necessary to do a good job.
No one is worried about a bias against "bad" developers. The problem is that the same companies that are crying the most about a lack of available developers are (potentially) explicitly not hiring older developers. The cynical amongst us assume this is another tactic to keep employee costs down.
Re: Age Discrimination in Silicon Valley
#6How much of the "ageism" is actual discrimination and how much is "we have a small budget and need 80 hour weeks" that older workers won't accept?
I received an offer from a very interesting startup in southern California (down between LA and San Diego, not SF). The offer was $30K/year (with increases as revenue increased), with minimum 80 hours a week expected. As cool as the projects were... There's no way I at my current age and life situation could possibly make that work. Ten years ago? Maybe. Fifteen years ago? You bet!
Re: Age Discrimination in Silicon Valley
#7Well there goes another person who is "offended". Is there age discrimination? Possibly, but at my workplace there are a lot of slackers and you guessed it, they're usually (emphasis on "usually", stop trolling) older, paper pushers, "Let's have a meeting to talk about changing a line of code" people, etc. Needless to say, I work in a big company. The best way to avoid discrimination of any kind is to continuously up…
And conversely, I've worked on teams where most of the developers were "inexperienced" and didn't have the skills necessary to do a good job. No one is worried about a bias against "bad" developers. The problem is that the same companies that are crying the most about a lack of available developers are (potentially) explicitly not hiring older developers. The cynical amongst us assume this is another tactic to keep e…
Well, it's not a big jump if they are willing to collude illegally to depress wages.
Re: Age Discrimination in Silicon Valley
#8How much of the "ageism" is actual discrimination and how much is "we have a small budget and need 80 hour weeks" that older workers won't accept? I received an offer from a very interesting startup in southern California (down between LA and San Diego, not SF). The offer was $30K/year (with increases as revenue increased), with minimum 80 hours a week expected. As cool as the projects were... There's no way I at my…
Depending on holidays (likely bare minimum) and vacation (likely none), that would only be minimum wage.
Re: Age Discrimination in Silicon Valley
#9A good company balances the overzealous enthusiasm of youth with the practicality of the wisdom that can only be attained through years, possibly decades, of work. The problem is a lot of people get jaded over time and forget what it was like to be young and excited to work on new (usually to them) projects. The older people tend to become downers if allowed to. Companies that can foster mutual respect between workers spanning multiple generations are the best. If everyone, old and young alike, can focus on continual growth and realizing we can all learn from one another then much can be achieved.
Re: Age Discrimination in Silicon Valley
#10>This latest report by Linkedin is where it hit me – something smells fishy about this. It is just too much of a coincidence that three of the major tech companies have issued almost identical “diversity” reports, and all three have been missing something screamingly obvious – any mention at all of age, or even an explanation as to why it is missing. This almost seems like collusion, it is almost certainly a cover up.
Someone needs to do more research before jumping to conclusions about motive. Age isn't reported in the US EEO-1 Survey [1] which is the basis of the diversity reports that various companies have recently published [2]. That's why the reports are nearly identical.
[1] http://www.eeoc.gov/employers/eeo1survey/index.cfm & http://www.eeoc.gov/employers/eeo1survey/ee1_datafile_2013.c...
[2] http://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en/...