4 ms·

This is a very American centrist point of view. In Europe everywhere I worked there were a bunch of 40+ year olds writing code, it's just yet another profession

This is a very American centrist point of view. In Europe everywhere I worked there were a bunch of 40+ year olds writing code, it's just yet another profession. No big deal. I've found even a good amount of people at that age that were career switching(to development) and haven't had big issues entering the job market. But of course, you have to be flexible. Move elsewhere, or where the jobs are. Your white hair doesn't matter as much as your attitude. If you feel entitled for good job positions just for the fact you wrote a library, I don't believe this can be positive. It isn't about your age. How long have you been looking for a job? Which city? Are you easy going? I've moved to another country and city for a better job market and I'm willing to do over and over again. Can't make big commitments to where I live, me and my wife move, find new jobs and learn new languages and culture, that's just life. We can't buy a property and never feel at home really, but it isn't a hard life, to be honest. Of course, we don't ever expect to make these american salaries, but we do have jobs. In America, it makes me think that a lot of management and business typey people who make decisions about hiring are very individualist folks that believe that one great person that works like a slave is better than a few average well-lived people, which is completely wrong.

atemerev 5y ago
"it's just yet another profession. No big deal". Exactly, in Europe software engineering is just another profession, with pretty average compensation. Which is not exactly motivating.
- kristaps 5y ago
  I'm from EU, finance and IT are neck to neck for highest paid professions. Absoute pay numbers are lower than US, but under no circumstances could they be called average.
  - atemerev 5y ago
    Finance is usually much higher paid (unless you work at US companies, e.g. European offices of Google or Facebook). It's not "average average", like the salary of a truck driver or a researcher in the academia, but still nothing to write home about. Regular engineers or senior people in the trades (e.g. HVAC installers) often earn comparable salaries.
- thiago_fm 5y ago
  Compensation is great. You can afford to have a good standard of living. I get paid much more than soft devs get in many cities in the US, of course, much less than SV and similar tech hubs, but I believe that those extreme salaries are mostly because of bubbly economics rather than something perenial. It won't last. If you can leave behind all that inequality and problems has, and only think of yourself, those tech hubs look like a good alternative, but personally I find it quite sad myself. I'd rather live in a place where my pumbler has good living conditions, the bus driver and so on. Also that has good public transport and more collective thinking. Driving a car in those big american streets would make me very depressed. It's a matter of choice(for some), but anyhow... here in Europe the situation is fine. :-)
_joel 5y ago
That indeed echos my experience here in the UK. I've worked with some fantastic senior programmers and learnt a lot from them, they were treated with prestige by HR (and therefore I'd assume recruiters, although I have no data for that)
neves 5y ago
I'm in Brasil and I think it is worse than USA. There are just bad jobs for new hires.
- irae 5y ago
  Symptom might be the same, but the root causes are completely different. Most people in their 40s that work as a developer already left Brazil or work remotely for overseas. What do you think this does to the market? Also, all the labour laws do a great deal to make things worse. The whole cost of a tech business in Brazil is so prohibitive that cutting down workforce to the cheapest possible became a practice. This means newly grads every year, and high rotation. I am not at all saying companies are correct in their assumption. I am just guessing where the cause is, in my opinion.
deleted 5y ago
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atemerev 5y ago

"it's just yet another profession. No big deal". Exactly, in Europe software engineering is just another profession, with pretty average compensation. Which is not exactly motivating.

kristaps 5y ago
I'm from EU, finance and IT are neck to neck for highest paid professions. Absoute pay numbers are lower than US, but under no circumstances could they be called average.
- atemerev 5y ago
  Finance is usually much higher paid (unless you work at US companies, e.g. European offices of Google or Facebook). It's not "average average", like the salary of a truck driver or a researcher in the academia, but still nothing to write home about. Regular engineers or senior people in the trades (e.g. HVAC installers) often earn comparable salaries.
thiago_fm 5y ago
Compensation is great. You can afford to have a good standard of living. I get paid much more than soft devs get in many cities in the US, of course, much less than SV and similar tech hubs, but I believe that those extreme salaries are mostly because of bubbly economics rather than something perenial. It won't last. If you can leave behind all that inequality and problems has, and only think of yourself, those tech hubs look like a good alternative, but personally I find it quite sad myself. I'd rather live in a place where my pumbler has good living conditions, the bus driver and so on. Also that has good public transport and more collective thinking. Driving a car in those big american streets would make me very depressed. It's a matter of choice(for some), but anyhow... here in Europe the situation is fine. :-)

_joel 5y ago

That indeed echos my experience here in the UK. I've worked with some fantastic senior programmers and learnt a lot from them, they were treated with prestige by HR (and therefore I'd assume recruiters, although I have no data for that)

neves 5y ago

I'm in Brasil and I think it is worse than USA. There are just bad jobs for new hires.

irae 5y ago
Symptom might be the same, but the root causes are completely different. Most people in their 40s that work as a developer already left Brazil or work remotely for overseas. What do you think this does to the market? Also, all the labour laws do a great deal to make things worse. The whole cost of a tech business in Brazil is so prohibitive that cutting down workforce to the cheapest possible became a practice. This means newly grads every year, and high rotation. I am not at all saying companies are correct in their assumption. I am just guessing where the cause is, in my opinion.

deleted 5y ago

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