That makes sense. If all you need is someone with a few years' experience, the younger candidates are probably going to be willing to work longer hours, for le

That makes sense. If all you need is someone with a few years' experience, the younger candidates are probably going to be willing to work longer hours, for less money, than the older candidates. In other words, why pay a 20+ year veteran a lot of money to do Rails programming when a recent college grad knows enough to do a decent job, and can be paid an entry-level salary? Not every engineer on a team needs to be senior. I suspect this is also good career advice: if you don't want to compete with entry-level programmers for jobs, specialize in an area where more experience makes you a more desirable job candidate.