4 ms·

Ageism is often conflated with higher compensation expectations.

ghaff 4y ago
While it's certainly very real, it's conflated with a lot of things: compensation expectations, specialization, potentially not up on current trends, maybe set in ways, etc.
- bcrosby95 4y ago
  I think a big one is there just being fewer old programmers so you don't see them as much so you think there's ageism. But the market has grown a ton over the past 10-20 years. None of my friends in their 40s have trouble getting jobs. This includes software jobs that tend to skew young, such as game dev and startups. I wouldn't doubt it exists, but anecdotally it doesn't seem to be such a huge problem that you can't continue coding until a standard retirement age.
  - ghaff 4y ago
    Maybe naive but I don't really see 40s as ageism territory in general. That said, a lot of people adapt. Go into management. More externally facing roles. Different types of companies.
    - bcrosby95 4y ago
      I guess what's old is new? In my 20s I was told 30 is the end of the line. In my 30s I was told its the 40s. Now the bar is higher. Maybe I'm part of a large enough cohort of programmers that we continually push ageism out, and due to that it will be 'solved' as we hit our 60s and 70s.
      - ghaff 4y ago
        The key is probably that you can't be doing at 40 what you're doing at 20. Whether that means better technical skills, better management skills, better communication skills, just better able to navigate a company and the industry... It probably does mean that, if someone just wants to code, they probably have a higher bar than people interested in doing a more diverse set of things.
UncleOxidant 4y ago
I'm in my late 50s. When I hear about the salaries that much younger folks are pulling down in the FAANG companies I'm generally pretty shocked - I've never made anything close to that and don't have any expectations to. My expenses are way lower than most of the younger folks in tech because my house is paid off (will be in about a month), we drive 20 year old cars and we're quite frugal. For most of the past decade I've worked in startups where the pay hasn't been great but the work has been very interesting (in some cases, fun, even) so I'm willing to make that tradeoff. To summarize: I'd be willing to work for $90K/year if it was working on something I found interesting in an early stage startup (You get more control the earlier you get in). Are my compensation expectations high?
- aerovistae 4y ago
  I wouldn't say so....90k is low for someone with a lot of experience. New grads expect more than that.
  - UncleOxidant 4y ago
    Yeah, that's exactly my point. The post above mine was implying that older workers demand higher pay. But I think it's the younger workers that demand higher pay.
  - bunnyhop 4y ago
    The skew for pay in the dev industry is weird. When I graduated with my BS (2008) I was happy enough to find a junior position in game dev on the west coast at 40k. Mind you that was during a lovely market crash, but after 4 years in game dev my pay didn't increase very much (but my profit sharing did /eyeroll). Fast forward to the present, I work non-FAANG at a 210k salary and am only required to do dev work with no management silliness and no required overtime. My company hires juniors straight out of college at around 100k... this blows my mind.
- klipt 4y ago
  Compensation in the SF Bay Area is another level but so is cost of housing in the SF Bay Area. So it's kind of a wash. Although if you're willing to rent and live frugally in the Bay Area you can save a lot.

While it's certainly very real, it's conflated with a lot of things: compensation expectations, specialization, potentially not up on current trends, maybe set in ways, etc.

bcrosby95 4y ago
I think a big one is there just being fewer old programmers so you don't see them as much so you think there's ageism. But the market has grown a ton over the past 10-20 years. None of my friends in their 40s have trouble getting jobs. This includes software jobs that tend to skew young, such as game dev and startups. I wouldn't doubt it exists, but anecdotally it doesn't seem to be such a huge problem that you can't continue coding until a standard retirement age.
- ghaff 4y ago
  Maybe naive but I don't really see 40s as ageism territory in general. That said, a lot of people adapt. Go into management. More externally facing roles. Different types of companies.
  - bcrosby95 4y ago
    I guess what's old is new? In my 20s I was told 30 is the end of the line. In my 30s I was told its the 40s. Now the bar is higher. Maybe I'm part of a large enough cohort of programmers that we continually push ageism out, and due to that it will be 'solved' as we hit our 60s and 70s.
    - ghaff 4y ago
      The key is probably that you can't be doing at 40 what you're doing at 20. Whether that means better technical skills, better management skills, better communication skills, just better able to navigate a company and the industry... It probably does mean that, if someone just wants to code, they probably have a higher bar than people interested in doing a more diverse set of things.

UncleOxidant 4y ago

I'm in my late 50s. When I hear about the salaries that much younger folks are pulling down in the FAANG companies I'm generally pretty shocked - I've never made anything close to that and don't have any expectations to. My expenses are way lower than most of the younger folks in tech because my house is paid off (will be in about a month), we drive 20 year old cars and we're quite frugal. For most of the past decade I've worked in startups where the pay hasn't been great but the work has been very interesting (in some cases, fun, even) so I'm willing to make that tradeoff. To summarize: I'd be willing to work for $90K/year if it was working on something I found interesting in an early stage startup (You get more control the earlier you get in). Are my compensation expectations high?

aerovistae 4y ago
I wouldn't say so....90k is low for someone with a lot of experience. New grads expect more than that.
- UncleOxidant 4y ago
  Yeah, that's exactly my point. The post above mine was implying that older workers demand higher pay. But I think it's the younger workers that demand higher pay.
- bunnyhop 4y ago
  The skew for pay in the dev industry is weird. When I graduated with my BS (2008) I was happy enough to find a junior position in game dev on the west coast at 40k. Mind you that was during a lovely market crash, but after 4 years in game dev my pay didn't increase very much (but my profit sharing did /eyeroll). Fast forward to the present, I work non-FAANG at a 210k salary and am only required to do dev work with no management silliness and no required overtime. My company hires juniors straight out of college at around 100k... this blows my mind.
klipt 4y ago
Compensation in the SF Bay Area is another level but so is cost of housing in the SF Bay Area. So it's kind of a wash. Although if you're willing to rent and live frugally in the Bay Area you can save a lot.