When someone tells me "think of all you can learn!" When trying to sell me on a project / job I always say, "as long as it comes with an ever growing pay check"

To me it's just a way "the man" tries to keep us underpaid. Interesting work or experience is not a substitute for money. In truth, the more learning required, the more stress (typically) and thus, the more money I'd like for my services.

Interesting. I don't think you being 30 makes it mostly about money. There probably is some other factor than your age.

I'm 32 and for me it's about work-life balance and high quality codebase - apparently that makes me very average.

The older I get the less it is about money, because life is short, and money starts losing its power to buy happiness quickly once you pass a threshold which is very easy to reach as an experienced software developer. A job which pays a lot of money can also make you miserable, comprehensively so, to such a degree that there is nothing you can spend that extra money on which will make up for it. In my experience the jobs which have paid the most did so because they had to, because nobody would put up with them otherwise; so "best salary in the industry" has become a negative signal.

I'm turning 30 soon too. What I care about and look for in a job has changed over the years (and my guess, will continue to change).

I was all about the company mission, working somewhere that was growing quickly, and getting hands-on experience. After I burned out a bit, I looked for work/life balance and was focused on making and saving money. After a couple of years, I missed the excitement, passion, and long hours. While I'm definitely hoping to turn Key Values into a revenue-generating business (ie. money is on my mind), I'm really motivated by challenging myself with something new, learning, and this mission to help match companies and job-seekers.

But trust me, for the previous 2 years, I was mostly about the money too. (Maybe 60% money, 40% learning the skills to try and start a business of my own.) If I hadn't made money a priority, I wouldn't have been able to do what I'm doing now.

I'm turning 50 and most of the list is nonsense.

Amen brother. $$$ what matters the rest is just pretty words.

That’s right. They can take away the stuff the culture depends on, they can take away the workplace you feel so secure in, but the compensation is written into the contract. Plus that’s the actual reason why we all get up in the morning and do this shit.