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Why Ageism Never Gets Old

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Re: Why Ageism Never Gets Old

#131

Post by moduspol »

kurthr wrote: post #124
moduspol wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and all sorts of underlying reasons are hidden by assuming "-isms" and victimhood at the first sign of disparate outcomes. But trying to address perceived ageism doesn't solve the problem. Being aware of contributing factors and correcting for them on an individual level does.

How do you individually address an issue where the hiring manager is making a generic decision based on age unrelated to your individual performance (especially in hiring where they have no idea how many hours you personally work)? Why should dying your hair and wearing skinny jeans affect your hire rate? "-isms" don't work because they are rational individually, although they might work because they are stereotypica…

> How do you individually address an issue where the hiring manager is making a generic decision based on age unrelated to your individual performance (especially in hiring where they have no idea how many hours you personally work)?

There isn't evidence of this, but even if you believed that were the case, you combat it the same way you would any other weak point of your value proposition. You address it head on in a tactful way that resolves those concerns without having to be asked explicitly.

That could include interest and experience in an emerging tool or architecture (combats stereotype that skillset is outdated), casual commentary on the latest Game of Thrones or Silicon Valley season (combats stereotype of bad cultural fit), or a true passion in solving the problems the company sets out to solve (combats stereotype of clock-in clock-out worker). It could also include adjusting your salary expectations more in-line with what your competition is expecting (if necessary).

The possibility that ageism is not the only cause cannot be simply ignored.

Re: Why Ageism Never Gets Old

#132

Post by fjsolwmv »

Swinx43 wrote: post #7
jeremyjh wrote: post #3

> In the nineteen-twenties, an engineer’s “half life of knowledge”—the time it took for half of his expertise to become obsolete—was thirty-five years. In the nineteen-sixties, it was a decade. Now it’s five years at most, and, for a software engineer, less than three. This sort of mythology is NOT helping. An experienced Software Engineer has valuable skills that do not age at all. Yes there are new languages and fr…

This mythology leads directly to horribly created software that will either ensure many terrible security breaches in the future or the continued proliferation of "magic" throughout a product. One of the issues is using the word "engineer" for any of the brogrammer types. an engineer in any other proper engineering discipline does not become worthless with age, their experience actually counts for something. Somehow…

When you say "brogrammer" it makes people not want to read the rest of your comment. Please be civil on HN and in general in the world.

Re: Why Ageism Never Gets Old

#133

Post by fjsolwmv »

balabaster wrote: post #79
moduspol wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's ageism if one person is selected based on being willing to work more for less money. That's just a labor market. There's an argument to be made that 20-somethings shouldn't work more than 40 hours a week or should require higher pay. Or that employers should place more value on the work of more experienced developers. Or both. But I don't think experienced developers should be exempt from keeping w…

Never compete on price. Provide something that nobody else can and stick with it, otherwise it's a race to the bottom. Those companies that hire the cheapest labour will get the quality they pay for. Let them, it's not your problem. There are enough who care about doing it right that they will eventually find you and will pay you according to the value you bring.

Amazon competes on price

Re: Why Ageism Never Gets Old

#134

Post by CaptSpify »

eicossa wrote: post #76
ryandrake wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You bring up a good point: Despite older people having all of the wealth in the world (and likely a great deal of the income), few startups seem to be courting them as customers. Everyone's target end-user seems to be that mythical 15-25 year old middle class Ideal Consumer.

Could it be because older people are also going to be much more unwilling to try something new ? Noophilia seems to be a feature of youth.

I don't have any numbers on this and would welcome any, but it seems true. How many young people are willing to sign up for $how_new_website_of_the_week vs older people? My personal experience is that older people realize that the website will likely disappear within the next 2-3 years, so they ignore it until it actually catches on. Younger people seem willing to sign up for anything new.

How many young vs old people used myspace or facebook when they first came out? How many young vs old people use instagram, whatsapp, etc ?

Once again, I have no numbers, but I'm guessing it's heavily skewed towards younger people.

Re: Why Ageism Never Gets Old

#135

Post by sillysaurus3 »

moduspol wrote: post #123
Swinx43 wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think it's ageism if one person is selected based on being willing to work more for less money. That's just a labor market. Agreed, however very few ever come out and says that so directly. In a lot of cases the reasons are given as not having the right "cultural fit", or being "over qualified" or some other excuse because the person hiring cannot stomach it to simply say "we want cheap resources that we ca…

Agreed on all points, but we're going down a dark road when any measurable disparity is assumed to be an unfair "-ism" without evidence, that must be corrected because clearly the decisionmaking gatekeepers are "-ists." It's possible the problem (at a macro level) is caused by other correlating factors, such as differing salary expectations and how up-to-date skillsets are.

I'd like to share my story related to ageism:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15642428

If it's that hard for me, it seems true to say it's much harder for someone much older.

I hear you about the -ism fanaticism. But there seem to be serious problems on the horizon. I can't make you believe them. All I can do is try to relate it to something in your life.

Re: Why Ageism Never Gets Old

#136

Post by blub »

notyourday wrote: post #104
jeremyjh wrote: post #3

> In the nineteen-twenties, an engineer’s “half life of knowledge”—the time it took for half of his expertise to become obsolete—was thirty-five years. In the nineteen-sixties, it was a decade. Now it’s five years at most, and, for a software engineer, less than three. This sort of mythology is NOT helping. An experienced Software Engineer has valuable skills that do not age at all. Yes there are new languages and fr…

If you are 40 and you are still thinking about your skills in terms of "i can code", then I have very bad news for you. There are hundreds of people who can code just as good as you who are younger which means that they are going to replace you because you are just not that good or that irreplaceable . Is there a way out? Sure: 1. If you actually are that good of a software engineer, start a My Code As Service compan…

Coding does matter, but most companies can only extract a limited amount of value from code, due to various dysfunctionalities in how they operate.

Being a good coder in such a company could be problematic, because they won't be able to recognize ability or benefit from the difference in skill to an average coder. These companies will treat programmers poorly, will try to save costs, outsource, etc.

I don't get why you claim that younger people will replace 40-somethings. It's not like the older devs will break outside of the warranty period.

Re: Why Ageism Never Gets Old

#137

Post by billmalarky »

fjsolwmv wrote: post #132
Swinx43 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This mythology leads directly to horribly created software that will either ensure many terrible security breaches in the future or the continued proliferation of "magic" throughout a product. One of the issues is using the word "engineer" for any of the brogrammer types. an engineer in any other proper engineering discipline does not become worthless with age, their experience actually counts for something. Somehow…

When you say "brogrammer" it makes people not want to read the rest of your comment. Please be civil on HN and in general in the world.

Are we really this thin skinned? It's a funny portmanteau not a slur.

Re: Why Ageism Never Gets Old

#138

Post by dozzie »

fjsolwmv wrote: post #133
balabaster wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Never compete on price. Provide something that nobody else can and stick with it, otherwise it's a race to the bottom. Those companies that hire the cheapest labour will get the quality they pay for. Let them, it's not your problem. There are enough who care about doing it right that they will eventually find you and will pay you according to the value you bring.

Amazon competes on price

Never take universal quantifiers literally.

Re: Why Ageism Never Gets Old

#139

Post by zanny »

amelius wrote: post #4

I always love to hear about cultures where old people are the most respected of a society. I think such cultures are happier, because they ensure that the future looks bright, no matter how old someone is. But ... such cultures might be in conflict with the information society we have built.

I've met plenty of those up in age that can adapt and learn new technologies. There is no impairment from age, at least for most people until their 70s, that really stops them from learning new things or adapting to change. I've worked with a music instructor in his 60s who runs his own website and actively learns new web tech just because he thinks its cool, as an anecdotal recent example.

Its in the same cultural structure as the general anti-intellectualism movement. The older you are, the more memories and experiences you have, the more sunk cost you have in the skills you already acquired and the more resentful you are to have to acknowledge their obsolescence.

It becomes really easy to just say no when you have some amassed capital to having to adapt to changing in-demand skills. That is what the entire argument Trump made regarding coal miners has been - obsoleted workers who don't want to change and a president who promised them to make the world stop changing for them.

In practice there is legitimate ageism, especially in startup culture. But there are super strong parallels between ageism and sexism - there is the structural and the intentional. With each:

Explicit Sexism: Radical Tumblr feminists, "Incels", "Women belong in the kitchen", actively choosing to not hire an equally skilled person because they are a certain gender, or actively and intentionally paying someone less because of their gender for the same job.

Explicit Ageism: Old people can't learn new tricks, "millennials are ruining X", not hiring someone due to just age.

Structural Sexism: Women going into less in-demand or lower paying careers, leading to the average woman making less money per hour spent working than the average man.

Structural Ageism: Wanting to pay less for a job, regardless of skill, thus discriminating against those with lots of experience (ie, older people).

The former are just obviously evil, the later are consequences of the way we prioritize our society. Getting rid of the former are generally easy because you can just denounce sexists and ageists. Getting rid of the later requires whole cultures to shift, which is much harder to do.

But ageism isn't that unique among most other discriminations by physical characteristics. Humanity runs the gamut on ways to make other peoples lives worse due to circumstances beyond their control.

Re: Why Ageism Never Gets Old

#140

Post by ataturk »

sidlls wrote: post #85
moduspol wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's ageism if one person is selected based on being willing to work more for less money. That's just a labor market. There's an argument to be made that 20-somethings shouldn't work more than 40 hours a week or should require higher pay. Or that employers should place more value on the work of more experienced developers. Or both. But I don't think experienced developers should be exempt from keeping w…

> I don't think it's ageism if one person is selected based on being willing to work more for less money. That's just a labor market. All sorts of discrimination exists still because "perfectly rational" arguments like yours ignore underlying reasons. For example: it's the same justification racists used for intelligence tests for voting not too long ago.

Uhhhh...okay, how old are you? Let me offer some grounding: You've got roughly 30 years to make all the money you are going to make in your career, and that's if some disease, physical problem, or mental issue doesn't knock you down sooner.

If you start out cheap and sell yourself short, you are going to have to make it up somewhere along the line.

Are you still with me?

How are you going to pick up the slack at age 40 and still be "cheap?" You can't! Salary, like law, is based on precedent. Each job you get should pay more up until you decide to downshift or semi-retire to some other field.

Each year you work, you should be getting at least a cost-of-living type increase. If you're aren't thinking about retirement, you aren't doing things right and even if you're living paycheck to paycheck, do you have any plan for how you're going to keep on if your paychecks get smaller instead of larger? Why have a career if this basic concept isn't followed?

So "that's just a labor market" is true, but a labor market that continuously discounts experience all the while demanding more of it is one that is completely out of touch with reality and with the reality of why we work at all and what its purpose for us is!

People go through tragedies in their lives--either personal ones or shared ones due to recessions (layoffs, changes in what skills are marketable). You must demand top dollar for your skills for as long as you can because your chances of "making it up later" or recovering from a hardship are nil.

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