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While it may be upsetting for people I see nothing wrong with people over 50 having a harder time getting their foot trough the "front door" than young people.

While it may be upsetting for people I see nothing wrong with people over 50 having a harder time getting their foot trough the "front door" than young people. You had over half of your working career to network, get contacts, recommendations, etc. - if you're still applying for public job ads like the people in 20s and 30s then sorry but this probably means you weren't really good enough at your previous jobs for people to notice you and recommend you. A lot of senior hiring goes trough recommendations - if you aren't on anybody's "let's call this guy for X" and you spent 20+ work years on the job I'd rather gamble with unproven guy that has potential than someone with a disappointing track record. And this is true even when assuming that age doesn't affect your job performance (which it does, and past 50s you're past your prime and as we've discussed before your experience isn't enough to put you on someones recommendation list then it probably isn't that valuable). Naturally there will be exceptions to this but I have a feeling that this logic applies in the majority case.

jqm 11y ago
What if "X" to call the guy for doesn't exist anymore? Say for example (of course this could never occur) that a brand new web development paradigm came out and javascript died almost overnight. Say (in this hypothetical example) it was very easy and required almost no learning and anyone could do it almost right away. How is all the networking done with fellow javascript people going to help a web developer find a new job?
- moonchrome 11y ago
  Networking doesn't really work like that from my experience, you show people that you're reliable and a good person to work with in some area they will assume you can transfer to Y even if you specialize in X, even senior positions hire people without direct experience and not only in software. I've seen things like this happen in several jobs I've worked with - not all of which were programming (eg. at my first job CTP was replacing old printing plate development with manual film montage/exposure). People good enough at their work saw this sort of thing coming a long time ahead and start moving to the next thing way before it actually happened, people who got hit by it were people who barely knew their job to begin with and had no interest in keeping up to date - so I don't think this goes against my point. And are you really surprised that people with no relevant experience get discriminated on age ? If your experience is completely irrelevant then you don't really have a lot to offer over a younger person (and younger in this context means <50 which is different from the classic software story of 20 yearolds vs 40 yearols where the differences are still debatable, there are undeniable differences in the below above 50 age groups, you're just past your prime at that point at least when it comes to adapting to new things).
- gregpilling 11y ago
  that exact scenario happened to a good friend of mine. Automation took his specialty from a 6 figure income to $300/year in exactly five years. It took him 8 years to rebuild his business making custom tools.
coldtea 11y ago
>You had over half of your working career to network, get contacts, recommendations, etc. - if you're still applying for public job ads like the people in 20s and 30s then sorry but this probably means you weren't really good enough at your previous jobs for people to notice you and recommend you. So? 200+ millions of Americans need to have a job to feed themselves. And several millions of programmers. Not just the top 10% of them. Just because you weren't good enough in "networking, recommendations" or some "super star" to have a nice looking resume to be auto-hirable etc, doesn't mean you should starve if you happen to get laid off your job after your fifties...
- moonchrome 11y ago
  You are not top 10% if you have connections and recommendations past 50. I would say you are bottom 10-20% if you don't. I'm not talking auto-hire/top employees - just people who know who they could talk to if they lost their job and would get picked up in a reasonable amount of time. It's really not that high of a bar. It's very likely that a person past 50s stranded competing with 20/30 yearolds willing to take junior positions without references is the kind of person that you don't want to hire in the first place and that's not even taking age effects in to consideration
  - coldtea 11y ago
    >You are not top 10% if you have connections and recommendations past 50. I would say you are bottom 10-20% if you don't. Which would make it a problem "only" for about 30+ million people or so if they get fired... That is, if the idea that "80% of people over 50 have recommendations/connections that can land them a job" is correct in the first place, which, hearing from people that age that have difficulty finding a job (in their field of course -- not getting a gig welcoming customers at McDonalds) when laid off, I don't think it is.

jqm 11y ago

What if "X" to call the guy for doesn't exist anymore? Say for example (of course this could never occur) that a brand new web development paradigm came out and javascript died almost overnight. Say (in this hypothetical example) it was very easy and required almost no learning and anyone could do it almost right away. How is all the networking done with fellow javascript people going to help a web developer find a new job?

moonchrome 11y ago
Networking doesn't really work like that from my experience, you show people that you're reliable and a good person to work with in some area they will assume you can transfer to Y even if you specialize in X, even senior positions hire people without direct experience and not only in software. I've seen things like this happen in several jobs I've worked with - not all of which were programming (eg. at my first job CTP was replacing old printing plate development with manual film montage/exposure). People good enough at their work saw this sort of thing coming a long time ahead and start moving to the next thing way before it actually happened, people who got hit by it were people who barely knew their job to begin with and had no interest in keeping up to date - so I don't think this goes against my point. And are you really surprised that people with no relevant experience get discriminated on age ? If your experience is completely irrelevant then you don't really have a lot to offer over a younger person (and younger in this context means <50 which is different from the classic software story of 20 yearolds vs 40 yearols where the differences are still debatable, there are undeniable differences in the below above 50 age groups, you're just past your prime at that point at least when it comes to adapting to new things).
gregpilling 11y ago
that exact scenario happened to a good friend of mine. Automation took his specialty from a 6 figure income to $300/year in exactly five years. It took him 8 years to rebuild his business making custom tools.

coldtea 11y ago

>You had over half of your working career to network, get contacts, recommendations, etc. - if you're still applying for public job ads like the people in 20s and 30s then sorry but this probably means you weren't really good enough at your previous jobs for people to notice you and recommend you. So? 200+ millions of Americans need to have a job to feed themselves. And several millions of programmers. Not just the top 10% of them. Just because you weren't good enough in "networking, recommendations" or some "super star" to have a nice looking resume to be auto-hirable etc, doesn't mean you should starve if you happen to get laid off your job after your fifties...

moonchrome 11y ago
You are not top 10% if you have connections and recommendations past 50. I would say you are bottom 10-20% if you don't. I'm not talking auto-hire/top employees - just people who know who they could talk to if they lost their job and would get picked up in a reasonable amount of time. It's really not that high of a bar. It's very likely that a person past 50s stranded competing with 20/30 yearolds willing to take junior positions without references is the kind of person that you don't want to hire in the first place and that's not even taking age effects in to consideration
- coldtea 11y ago
  >You are not top 10% if you have connections and recommendations past 50. I would say you are bottom 10-20% if you don't. Which would make it a problem "only" for about 30+ million people or so if they get fired... That is, if the idea that "80% of people over 50 have recommendations/connections that can land them a job" is correct in the first place, which, hearing from people that age that have difficulty finding a job (in their field of course -- not getting a gig welcoming customers at McDonalds) when laid off, I don't think it is.