I'm over 35. I work at Google. I got my job when I was over 35. I've interviewed people over 35. Very few of the applicants I've met and/or interviewed have been extended an offer. None of it has anything to do with age. It all comes down to one thing:
There are a shocking number of people who work as programmers who cannot actually program.
The industry as a whole is crying out for people who can get shit done. If you can do that age is no barrier. Ageism, at least as far as programmers go, seems to be used as an excuse by those unable or unwilling to get a job as to why they can't get a job.
EDIT: the fact that this is Google I think makes my point rather than detracts from it. If at 35 with no particularly amazing background I can get hired at a top-tier employer, why not any employer?
You can argue that lower-tier employers are more biased but in my experience they're also less selective (or at least they select for different traits).
I think you're being too quick to dismiss the article because of your Google experience. Google may be one of the few enlightened companies which doesn't think this way.
Life being risky if you're over 35 is a regular topic of conversation in my circles. Vivek Wadhwa (IIRC) even had data showing that salary plateaus and then drops after 40.
Bull shit. Cletus is absolutely right. I'm a grumpy old Indian bastard in my mid-40s and I can find a job without breaking a sweat.
I'm sick and tired of these thinly-veiled-fascist stories that lay blame on Indians, Chinese, Arabs, Mexicans, Muslims, women, young people, martians etc, just because the dude that wrote the story is a big fat loser.
Learn new skills, keep networking, get with the program, learn to compete or deal with it. I'm no genius but my salary did not plateau at age 40.
First off, it's good to hear that I might be wrong.
But. The discussion here is about the general trend in the industry; nobody disputes that there are companies like Google (and probably Microsoft, Intel) which value experience and expertise. Do you think that across the board in our industry, older folks do not find it harder to get hired?
Third, when did you last switch jobs? I ask this only to find out if you really easily found a job, or you just think you might be able to find one.
In my experience, some older folks (over 40) seem to have this weird self-negating issue where they seem to lose confidence in themselves. I've known some truly badass programmers, stuck in shitty positions but don't move because of their own fear. So I think when you say "older folks find it harder to get hired", it becomes a self perpetuating kind of mindset.
The reality is that industry is dying to find people that can get shit done, as Cletus said. It doesn't fucking matter what you look like, your age, whether you have testicles or an ovary or neither like Data from STTNG.
My last gig was with a giant software company. BigCo management announced that my product would be canned in mid-Jan, effective March 31. Within 2 weeks of their announcement I had 4 opportunities (not counting internal opportunities) of which I chose the best one, starting in 10 days.
I'm not doing anything special, but life is good :-)
I thought the "keep skill sharp, network, deliver the goods" advice was just BS. But it seems to be good.
Yes, I did notice in almost all profiles in news articles of the older unemployed people that those individuals had let their skills seriously rust. Good to hear some first information.
While we're en the teritory of anecdoteism, let me add that as a manager, I am much more inclined to hire someone over 30. Not only do they tend to have more experience and thus be technically better skilled, but they also tend to be better at getting up in the morning, managing their time, communicating with colleagues and just generally act as grown ups. Managing teenagers gets old very fast.
It depends what you mean by getting shit done though. The thing about 40-year-olds is that they want fair compensation, have informed opinions, and some of them even have lives. Meanwhile, our industry works by raining money down on the glib or foolishly optimistic, who see engineers as mere implementors. So many managers prefer a compliant 20-year-old who will sacrifice sleep and life to execute on the latest "pivot".
My manager at Google was exactly like this, by the way. Once, after a few drinks at a party, he mused on how he would achieve greatness, striding over the bodies of burnt-out twentysomethings.
(Before you raise an obvious objection: yes, the code was in a shambles, before it even launched. But code quality has rarely been a crucial factor in career success in the Valley, as far as I can tell.)
I'm over 35. I work at Google. I got my job when I was over 35. I've interviewed people over 35. Very few of the applicants I've met and/or interviewed have been extended an offer. None of it has anything to do with age. It all comes down to one thing:
There are a shocking number of people who work as programmers who cannot actually program.
The industry as a whole is crying out for people who can get shit done. If you can do that age is no barrier. Ageism, at least as far as programmers go, seems to be used as an excuse by those unable or unwilling to get a job as to why they can't get a job.
EDIT: the fact that this is Google I think makes my point rather than detracts from it. If at 35 with no particularly amazing background I can get hired at a top-tier employer, why not any employer?
You can argue that lower-tier employers are more biased but in my experience they're also less selective (or at least they select for different traits).