I think the truth is that older, more experienced people do not provide visible value. For example, do you think it's undergraduates who come up with the desig

I think the truth is that older, more experienced people do not provide visible value. For example, do you think it's undergraduates who come up with the design and architecture for AWS? No, it's years of pain and lessons that go into it. Then the elders productize their pain and lessons so that undergrads never need to learn it. This is why FAANG want undergrads: their processes keep noobs from making super stupid mistakes, through the law of large numbers, some survive, feel some pain, learn and make it to architect level enough to affect the next iteration of AWS/Google/Azure. At the same time, the company saves on salaries/benefits/work-life balance. It won't change because it works. Act accordingly.