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I would have assumed that innovation increases with experiences, knowledge and resources. One of the reasons startups target the young is surely naivety, e.g.

I would have assumed that innovation increases with experiences, knowledge and resources. One of the reasons startups target the young is surely naivety, e.g. stock options, altruistic work, and so on. While older workers are happy to take their stable, high wage senior jobs. Only branching out into innovation when its under their own terms and they have a solid plan. What does everybody else think?

pmorici 9y ago
I agree. Maybe it is just the obscene cost of living in SF but I can't figure out for the life of me why a rational person would take a startup job there. Whenever you look at the salaries these companies pay they aren't the least bit competitive with companies in less expensive cities after accounting for the 50% higher cost of living. I was much less aware of these more sublet factors when I was younger and just out of school. It's impossible to ignore now that I'm older though.
- askafriend 9y ago
  The cost of living is only prohibitively higher if you have a wife and 2 kids. There are a ton of other scenarios where you earn and save a lot more in a city like SF. I have roommates for example and my rent is pretty cheap. I also don’t have a car - I just use Uber or Lyft. Saves a ton of money.
  - tfmatt 9y ago
    how do you get groceries? you uber to whole foods and back?
    - Morizero 9y ago
      (not op) I live in Boston. I have 3 grocery stores (2 supermarkets, 1 Korean grocer) within half a mile of me. One is directly on my bike route home. I walk or bike roughly once or twice a week and pick up a few days worth of food. Each visit lasts maybe 15 or so minutes. When I lived in the Midwest, I'd drive once a month and make it an all afternoon ordeal. Doing it the "Boston way" is probably a little less time on average, about the same cost (actually cheaper with the car cost), and yields a far fresher+healthier diet. When I lived in the Midwest, most produce would be rotten in a couple of weeks, most meat would end up at some point in my deep freezer, and dry goods (like box/can foods & starches) were the base of most meals. Now I eat fresh greens daily, rarely eat box foods, and shaved 5 points off my BMI.
    - nzjrs 9y ago
      I had to laugh. This is the most HN comment I have seen in a while.
    - htormey 9y ago
      I live in SF. Uber pool to Costco is ~$5. I have a Safeway around the corner and instacart isn’t that bad re price.
    - zghst 9y ago
      Usually what I see is people walking groceries back, just a couple bags, but there's always Lyft/Uber or even services like Zipcar or Getaround.
    - randomsearch 9y ago
      Do Americans not have food delivery services? Most people I know under 40 in the UK use supermarket delivery. Ordering once a week takes about 20 mins, delivered more or less when you want to the nearest hour.
    - devdad 9y ago
      The whole response thread of this question reads as satire.
      - askafriend 9y ago
        How so? Is it the delivery aspect? Grocery delivery is huge in other parts of the world already. In fact, some grocers run their own services - like Morrisons in the UK. The US is the one that's behind and if I were to take a guess, it's the suburban sprawl that makes last-mile delivery prohibitive in many parts of the mid-west, etc.
        devdad 9y ago
        Op states that it's ridiculously expensive. Others respond that it's not a problem since you can always shack up with friends or strangers and use different food deliveries to save money.
        askafriend 9y ago
        Living in a denser urban environment is just a completely different lifestyle than living somewhere in the midwest - you can't have the same set of expectations when comparing them. Just as living in Japan is completely different from living in Texas. Neither is better, and you don't have to force yourself to like one or the other. But you wouldn't go to live in Japan and expect a 2 story house with a backyard, and space to keep 3 Ford F-150s in a garage would you? In the same way, the entire lifestyle of living in SF/NYC is completely different than living elsewhere. Why use the same metrics to compare the very different lifestyles without taking into account that they are in fact different and can't so easily be compared? You must be willing to make adjustments to your lifestyle. If you are not willing to do this and you only compare different places against what's familiar - then just stay where you're comfortable - you'll never be happy anywhere else. I'm lucky enough to have lived in many many different types of environments throughout my life and I see the value in all of them. By the way, for what it's worth I love my current roommates - I much prefer living with them to living alone.
    - askafriend 9y ago
      No. I walk to one of the several supermarkets closeby and carry my groceries back. If I need large ticket items from Costco, I have them delivered through Instacart or Amazon Fresh and that will last me a month or more because I buy in bulk. I also split the Instacart delivery cost with my roommates often so it ends up being nothing. And even if I did Uber to Whole Foods and back - I would split the cost with at least one of my roommates who probably also need groceries. Even if I go by myself, I would much rather do this than own a car and pay for insurance, repairs, maintenance, gas and the general headache of owning a large depreciating object. Seriously, Uber to Whole Foods or Costco is like $5.
  - pmorici 9y ago
    What you are really saying is that the only people who can reasonably make it work are young people who have no family obligations and can live in ultra lean conditions. I guarantee you that anything you can do in SF to save money be that having lots of roommates, forgoing a car, etc... you can do in other metro areas of the US. I'm not knocking people who make the choice to do that but don't delude yourself; on a purly financial basis it is not a rational choice.
    - askafriend 9y ago
      I can do that in other metro areas, but I can't earn >$200k a year easily in other metro areas - not even close. Also don't forget about the beautiful weather year-round. I will have retirement money in my mid 30s and by 40 I can comfortably retire provided that I don't get hit by a car or suffer one of life's many random tragedies. If I have a significant other who is also a high earner, then ironically both of our cost of living will go down because of things like splitting rent, splitting groceries, making food at home (easier to shop groceries for 2+ people). A dual income household in SF with good career trajectories can easily put you in the half-a-mil a year range. It's the kids that make this infinitely more difficult. At that point I'd probably consider moving to a lower COL place. But I'm not sure I want kids - that's a decision for later. As much as people love to knock on SF, I have a great life here and so do so many others. It's absolutely possible if you're a decent software engineer which is the lens through which I write this comment. Obviously if you're making $60k a year in a commoditized career, you're going to have a bad time. Also if home ownership is that important to you for some reason, then SF probably isn't the place for you either.
      - pmorici 9y ago
        Here is one example that I'm aware of. I have friends who live in Baltimore and make over $200k+ as software engineers. One guy likes to be thrifty so he bought a house for $150k because it was cheaper than renting. You can't tell me that he would be better off in SF. He would need to be making over $300k to be in a similar financial position. No Startup is going to pay him that kind of money. I agree the weather is often nice and I love visiting SF but that's a non financial reason.
- greggman 9y ago
  As others have said before are we talking just salary or total compensation? My last company's stock did well so my total compensation was SF Salary * 4. The stock kept doing well so if I had stayed it would have been * 8. I don't know if that's more common in SF than else where and/or how lucky I was, my only point is it's good to know what's really being compared.
  - speedplane 9y ago
    Congratulations, you're a successful investor, most aren't. Doesn't say much about being an engineer though.
  - ryandrake 9y ago
    You're probably an outlier, but congratulations nonetheless. For most non-executives in tech, vested sellable equity is a minuscule part of the compensation package. I've been in technology for going on 20 years (~7 years in SF) and my equity compensation has not once been even 20% of my salary.
    - greggman 9y ago
      that my point though. AFAICT all the major bay area companies have bonuses to salary in the 50% to 100% range and more of they are doing well. they give you a yearly bonus and they give you some kind of equity. They do this because it's what the local competition for employees requires. So ... to reiterate ... the person I was replying to seemed to only be looking at salaries. You need to compare total comp not just salaries
greenhouse_gas 9y ago
I would actually put it stronger: most startup tech is quite mundane (or could easily be made mundane). Facebook started on a classic LAMP stack.
- mattgreenrocks 9y ago
  That was the most galling thing about the whole James Damore boondoggle: the insinuation that $GOOG’s work is so intellectually taxing that gender differences actually have an impact. I’m sure they have lots of difficult problems. And I’m also sure they have a lot of run-of-the-mill problems.
josephagoss 9y ago
I completely agree especially regarding older workers willing to branch out on their own terms. I've often found startups (anyone and any organization really) will often present their opportunity as very one sided to an extent. "This is what we offer, this is what is required and no, you have no wiggle room here". I've also found as I've aged and have more financial stability I'm less likely to get suckered into an arrangement that really doesn't benefit me. Also as I've aged I am less likely to fall into the FOMO trap. (Fear of missing out.) Just my 2 cents.
xellisx 9y ago
Younger me: "Yes I can do that, and I'll have to you in an hour"... 3 weeks later, less hair and a horrible implementation that "works". Older me: "Yes, but..."
ronilan 9y ago
It is simpler than that. There is a social link between age and authority. For the first third of your life almost anyone you interact with who has authorarive power over you is also older than you. Think parents, teachers, coaches, managers etc. A VC (or incubator mentor) will most likely have a stronger authorarive stance and feel more comfortable with younger founders. Founders will feel same with younger employees and so on down the hiring ladder. It requires maturity and confidence to "unlink" age and authority. In a culture as driven by "macho posturing" as the Silicon Valley startup world is, this, in most cases, ain't going to happen. Thus startups are young.
- dvddgld 9y ago
  I can see how that would account for a big part of the trend. We seem to be good at self-organizing into particular patterns. I do wonder how difficult it is to fight against such internal biases, and whether it's even worthwhile...
B-Con 9y ago
> Only branching out into innovation when its under their own terms and they have a solid plan. I think there's a lot to this. The young are more free with their energy and are more willing to throw it around haphazardly, everything is new to them. The older have been there done that and more adverse to wasting their time, thus more likely to only innovate when they believe they have a good idea and the means to execute on it.
curun1r 9y ago
It probably depends on the kind of innovation you're talking about. IIRC, most of the advances in mathematics come from younger mathematicians. Just like you're less likely to find innovative chess play in older players. So I'd imagine that most innovation that relies on pure ingenuity would come from younger folks. On the other hand, innovation that has a more social component to it or relies more on life experiences would probably favor those who've had more opportunities to hit on the right experience to trigger their innovation. The term "innovation" is probably too broad/generic to make any meaningful conclusions. It needs to be subcategorized to be useful in the way the article is positing. And from the sound of it, the research is using patent applications as a proxy for innovation which seems somewhat biased towards older people who understand the importance of getting all the legal ducks in a row, not to mention how many patents are anything but innovative. It also seems overly narrow since it misses lots of innovation that doesn't get codified as an invention.
- dvddgld 9y ago
  Agreed on all points, I meant "innovation" in the context of the study, which is certainly different to...well, actual innovation.
QML 9y ago
I've always heard it is the younger scientists and mathematicians who make the groundbreaking discoveries / innovative breakthroughs -- but on the shoulders of giants indeed.
bob_theslob646 9y ago
> One of the reasons startups target the young is surely naivety, e.g. stock options, altruistic work, and so on. While older workers are happy to take their stable, high wage senior jobs. Only branching out into innovation when its under their own terms and they have a solid plan. What about having different responsiblities ? I would argue, younger people have less responasibilites than a older person, who on average does not like change and is less likely to change than a young person due to the pain of change.(It's very difficult to move a family across the country if you are married and have kids and I would bet on average, the older you get, the less likely you are to do so ,on average) When I say " change" , I mean take risk. A younger person can afford to take on risk younger in life than an older person due to age bias in hiring practices.

pmorici 9y ago

I agree. Maybe it is just the obscene cost of living in SF but I can't figure out for the life of me why a rational person would take a startup job there. Whenever you look at the salaries these companies pay they aren't the least bit competitive with companies in less expensive cities after accounting for the 50% higher cost of living. I was much less aware of these more sublet factors when I was younger and just out of school. It's impossible to ignore now that I'm older though.

askafriend 9y ago
The cost of living is only prohibitively higher if you have a wife and 2 kids. There are a ton of other scenarios where you earn and save a lot more in a city like SF. I have roommates for example and my rent is pretty cheap. I also don’t have a car - I just use Uber or Lyft. Saves a ton of money.
- tfmatt 9y ago
  how do you get groceries? you uber to whole foods and back?
  - Morizero 9y ago
    (not op) I live in Boston. I have 3 grocery stores (2 supermarkets, 1 Korean grocer) within half a mile of me. One is directly on my bike route home. I walk or bike roughly once or twice a week and pick up a few days worth of food. Each visit lasts maybe 15 or so minutes. When I lived in the Midwest, I'd drive once a month and make it an all afternoon ordeal. Doing it the "Boston way" is probably a little less time on average, about the same cost (actually cheaper with the car cost), and yields a far fresher+healthier diet. When I lived in the Midwest, most produce would be rotten in a couple of weeks, most meat would end up at some point in my deep freezer, and dry goods (like box/can foods & starches) were the base of most meals. Now I eat fresh greens daily, rarely eat box foods, and shaved 5 points off my BMI.
  - nzjrs 9y ago
    I had to laugh. This is the most HN comment I have seen in a while.
  - htormey 9y ago
    I live in SF. Uber pool to Costco is ~$5. I have a Safeway around the corner and instacart isn’t that bad re price.
  - zghst 9y ago
    Usually what I see is people walking groceries back, just a couple bags, but there's always Lyft/Uber or even services like Zipcar or Getaround.
  - randomsearch 9y ago
    Do Americans not have food delivery services? Most people I know under 40 in the UK use supermarket delivery. Ordering once a week takes about 20 mins, delivered more or less when you want to the nearest hour.
  - devdad 9y ago
    The whole response thread of this question reads as satire.
    - askafriend 9y ago
      How so? Is it the delivery aspect? Grocery delivery is huge in other parts of the world already. In fact, some grocers run their own services - like Morrisons in the UK. The US is the one that's behind and if I were to take a guess, it's the suburban sprawl that makes last-mile delivery prohibitive in many parts of the mid-west, etc.
      - devdad 9y ago
        Op states that it's ridiculously expensive. Others respond that it's not a problem since you can always shack up with friends or strangers and use different food deliveries to save money.
        askafriend 9y ago
        Living in a denser urban environment is just a completely different lifestyle than living somewhere in the midwest - you can't have the same set of expectations when comparing them. Just as living in Japan is completely different from living in Texas. Neither is better, and you don't have to force yourself to like one or the other. But you wouldn't go to live in Japan and expect a 2 story house with a backyard, and space to keep 3 Ford F-150s in a garage would you? In the same way, the entire lifestyle of living in SF/NYC is completely different than living elsewhere. Why use the same metrics to compare the very different lifestyles without taking into account that they are in fact different and can't so easily be compared? You must be willing to make adjustments to your lifestyle. If you are not willing to do this and you only compare different places against what's familiar - then just stay where you're comfortable - you'll never be happy anywhere else. I'm lucky enough to have lived in many many different types of environments throughout my life and I see the value in all of them. By the way, for what it's worth I love my current roommates - I much prefer living with them to living alone.
  - askafriend 9y ago
    No. I walk to one of the several supermarkets closeby and carry my groceries back. If I need large ticket items from Costco, I have them delivered through Instacart or Amazon Fresh and that will last me a month or more because I buy in bulk. I also split the Instacart delivery cost with my roommates often so it ends up being nothing. And even if I did Uber to Whole Foods and back - I would split the cost with at least one of my roommates who probably also need groceries. Even if I go by myself, I would much rather do this than own a car and pay for insurance, repairs, maintenance, gas and the general headache of owning a large depreciating object. Seriously, Uber to Whole Foods or Costco is like $5.
- pmorici 9y ago
  What you are really saying is that the only people who can reasonably make it work are young people who have no family obligations and can live in ultra lean conditions. I guarantee you that anything you can do in SF to save money be that having lots of roommates, forgoing a car, etc... you can do in other metro areas of the US. I'm not knocking people who make the choice to do that but don't delude yourself; on a purly financial basis it is not a rational choice.
  - askafriend 9y ago
    I can do that in other metro areas, but I can't earn >$200k a year easily in other metro areas - not even close. Also don't forget about the beautiful weather year-round. I will have retirement money in my mid 30s and by 40 I can comfortably retire provided that I don't get hit by a car or suffer one of life's many random tragedies. If I have a significant other who is also a high earner, then ironically both of our cost of living will go down because of things like splitting rent, splitting groceries, making food at home (easier to shop groceries for 2+ people). A dual income household in SF with good career trajectories can easily put you in the half-a-mil a year range. It's the kids that make this infinitely more difficult. At that point I'd probably consider moving to a lower COL place. But I'm not sure I want kids - that's a decision for later. As much as people love to knock on SF, I have a great life here and so do so many others. It's absolutely possible if you're a decent software engineer which is the lens through which I write this comment. Obviously if you're making $60k a year in a commoditized career, you're going to have a bad time. Also if home ownership is that important to you for some reason, then SF probably isn't the place for you either.
    - pmorici 9y ago
      Here is one example that I'm aware of. I have friends who live in Baltimore and make over $200k+ as software engineers. One guy likes to be thrifty so he bought a house for $150k because it was cheaper than renting. You can't tell me that he would be better off in SF. He would need to be making over $300k to be in a similar financial position. No Startup is going to pay him that kind of money. I agree the weather is often nice and I love visiting SF but that's a non financial reason.
greggman 9y ago
As others have said before are we talking just salary or total compensation? My last company's stock did well so my total compensation was SF Salary * 4. The stock kept doing well so if I had stayed it would have been * 8. I don't know if that's more common in SF than else where and/or how lucky I was, my only point is it's good to know what's really being compared.
- speedplane 9y ago
  Congratulations, you're a successful investor, most aren't. Doesn't say much about being an engineer though.
- ryandrake 9y ago
  You're probably an outlier, but congratulations nonetheless. For most non-executives in tech, vested sellable equity is a minuscule part of the compensation package. I've been in technology for going on 20 years (~7 years in SF) and my equity compensation has not once been even 20% of my salary.
  - greggman 9y ago
    that my point though. AFAICT all the major bay area companies have bonuses to salary in the 50% to 100% range and more of they are doing well. they give you a yearly bonus and they give you some kind of equity. They do this because it's what the local competition for employees requires. So ... to reiterate ... the person I was replying to seemed to only be looking at salaries. You need to compare total comp not just salaries

greenhouse_gas 9y ago

I would actually put it stronger: most startup tech is quite mundane (or could easily be made mundane). Facebook started on a classic LAMP stack.

mattgreenrocks 9y ago
That was the most galling thing about the whole James Damore boondoggle: the insinuation that $GOOG’s work is so intellectually taxing that gender differences actually have an impact. I’m sure they have lots of difficult problems. And I’m also sure they have a lot of run-of-the-mill problems.

josephagoss 9y ago

I completely agree especially regarding older workers willing to branch out on their own terms. I've often found startups (anyone and any organization really) will often present their opportunity as very one sided to an extent. "This is what we offer, this is what is required and no, you have no wiggle room here". I've also found as I've aged and have more financial stability I'm less likely to get suckered into an arrangement that really doesn't benefit me. Also as I've aged I am less likely to fall into the FOMO trap. (Fear of missing out.) Just my 2 cents.

xellisx 9y ago

Younger me: "Yes I can do that, and I'll have to you in an hour"... 3 weeks later, less hair and a horrible implementation that "works". Older me: "Yes, but..."

ronilan 9y ago

It is simpler than that. There is a social link between age and authority. For the first third of your life almost anyone you interact with who has authorarive power over you is also older than you. Think parents, teachers, coaches, managers etc. A VC (or incubator mentor) will most likely have a stronger authorarive stance and feel more comfortable with younger founders. Founders will feel same with younger employees and so on down the hiring ladder. It requires maturity and confidence to "unlink" age and authority. In a culture as driven by "macho posturing" as the Silicon Valley startup world is, this, in most cases, ain't going to happen. Thus startups are young.

dvddgld 9y ago
I can see how that would account for a big part of the trend. We seem to be good at self-organizing into particular patterns. I do wonder how difficult it is to fight against such internal biases, and whether it's even worthwhile...

B-Con 9y ago

> Only branching out into innovation when its under their own terms and they have a solid plan. I think there's a lot to this. The young are more free with their energy and are more willing to throw it around haphazardly, everything is new to them. The older have been there done that and more adverse to wasting their time, thus more likely to only innovate when they believe they have a good idea and the means to execute on it.

curun1r 9y ago

It probably depends on the kind of innovation you're talking about. IIRC, most of the advances in mathematics come from younger mathematicians. Just like you're less likely to find innovative chess play in older players. So I'd imagine that most innovation that relies on pure ingenuity would come from younger folks. On the other hand, innovation that has a more social component to it or relies more on life experiences would probably favor those who've had more opportunities to hit on the right experience to trigger their innovation. The term "innovation" is probably too broad/generic to make any meaningful conclusions. It needs to be subcategorized to be useful in the way the article is positing. And from the sound of it, the research is using patent applications as a proxy for innovation which seems somewhat biased towards older people who understand the importance of getting all the legal ducks in a row, not to mention how many patents are anything but innovative. It also seems overly narrow since it misses lots of innovation that doesn't get codified as an invention.

dvddgld 9y ago
Agreed on all points, I meant "innovation" in the context of the study, which is certainly different to...well, actual innovation.

QML 9y ago

I've always heard it is the younger scientists and mathematicians who make the groundbreaking discoveries / innovative breakthroughs -- but on the shoulders of giants indeed.

bob_theslob646 9y ago

> One of the reasons startups target the young is surely naivety, e.g. stock options, altruistic work, and so on. While older workers are happy to take their stable, high wage senior jobs. Only branching out into innovation when its under their own terms and they have a solid plan. What about having different responsiblities ? I would argue, younger people have less responasibilites than a older person, who on average does not like change and is less likely to change than a young person due to the pain of change.(It's very difficult to move a family across the country if you are married and have kids and I would bet on average, the older you get, the less likely you are to do so ,on average) When I say " change" , I mean take risk. A younger person can afford to take on risk younger in life than an older person due to age bias in hiring practices.