I'm a U.S. citizen living in the Philippines. The culture in the Philippines has many of the same weird status quirks as that of India and you will never see th

I'm a U.S. citizen living in the Philippines. The culture in the Philippines has many of the same weird status quirks as that of India and you will never see this in the U.S. I think any age issues in programming in the U.S. might be more practical than status issues. Big corps are more rigid than scrappy start ups. Perhaps this causes issues that you might not see elsewhere. For example, everyone wants to make more money (probably through raises.) A 40 year old programmer who has been programming for 20+ years has probably maxed out on experience, possibly has maxed out on time on the job and eventually gets to a point where the position just can't offer any more money. The value of the position might even be less than the money paid to the programmer. At this point, the company would probably rather hire a fresh developer who can do the same job (which probably doesn't require all that experience anyways) for less money. So, if that programmer wants to make more money, then he / she probably needs to move on. The bottom line is that programmers need to always be looking at ways to move up the value chain (or at least demonstrate that he or she is worth that current salary.) The best way to do that is different in every situation. In some cases you might just hit that ceiling and you might need to move on. The only case where someone is going to start looking at age is that situation where he / she is getting too comfortable and too afraid to make big moves.