Studies suggest that many inventors do their best work at later stages
qz.com
qz.com
Patents are typically filed by folks working for large(ish) corporations or universities. For corporations its almost a given that someone senior up the chain is on the patent. In a university - its generally the professor(s) leading the lab that will always be on a patent filed on behalf of the lab irrespective of the work they've put into it. That behavior in itself is a bias towards having an older population be on more patents.
> For corporations its almost a given that someone senior up the chain is on the patent.
In my experience that isn't true and in cases where it did happen it would be an abuse of process. As a rule, royalties from patents are assigned to the employer, so there's very little to be gained by being an inventor that's tangible. All I and my co-inventors got were a few low denomination US and Canadian bank notes.
At my employer that's the case . Directors are pretty much on every patent that comes from their department.
Inventors' dates of birth aren't on patent applications. To carry out the research, the authors of http://www2.itif.org/2016-demographics-of-innovation.pdf had to contact the inventors directly, so would have been able to filter out obvious cases of abuse.
Guess what most twenty year old don't have?
[0] https://www.vox.com/2015/3/16/8225165/patents-innovation-soc...
So they come up with "studies suggest" and other nonsense like it.
Wasn't there an article a while back about how you lose your creativity and innovative powers as you grow older. And that's why most "innovation" in math, physics, tech and music come from younger people?
One of the reasons startups target the young is surely naivety, e.g. stock options, altruistic work, and so on. While older workers are happy to take their stable, high wage senior jobs. Only branching out into innovation when its under their own terms and they have a solid plan.
What does everybody else think?
I was much less aware of these more sublet factors when I was younger and just out of school. It's impossible to ignore now that I'm older though.
There are a ton of other scenarios where you earn and save a lot more in a city like SF.
I have roommates for example and my rent is pretty cheap. I also don’t have a car - I just use Uber or Lyft. Saves a ton of money.
Most people I know under 40 in the UK use supermarket delivery. Ordering once a week takes about 20 mins, delivered more or less when you want to the nearest hour.
The US is the one that's behind and if I were to take a guess, it's the suburban sprawl that makes last-mile delivery prohibitive in many parts of the mid-west, etc.
But you wouldn't go to live in Japan and expect a 2 story house with a backyard, and space to keep 3 Ford F-150s in a garage would you? In the same way, the entire lifestyle of living in SF/NYC is completely different than living elsewhere. Why use the same metrics to compare the very different lifestyles without taking into account that they are in fact different and can't so easily be compared?
You must be willing to make adjustments to your lifestyle. If you are not willing to do this and you only compare different places against what's familiar - then just stay where you're comfortable - you'll never be happy anywhere else.
I'm lucky enough to have lived in many many different types of environments throughout my life and I see the value in all of them.
By the way, for what it's worth I love my current roommates - I much prefer living with them to living alone.
If I need large ticket items from Costco, I have them delivered through Instacart or Amazon Fresh and that will last me a month or more because I buy in bulk.
I also split the Instacart delivery cost with my roommates often so it ends up being nothing.
And even if I did Uber to Whole Foods and back - I would split the cost with at least one of my roommates who probably also need groceries. Even if I go by myself, I would much rather do this than own a car and pay for insurance, repairs, maintenance, gas and the general headache of owning a large depreciating object. Seriously, Uber to Whole Foods or Costco is like $5.
I'm not knocking people who make the choice to do that but don't delude yourself; on a purly financial basis it is not a rational choice.
If I have a significant other who is also a high earner, then ironically both of our cost of living will go down because of things like splitting rent, splitting groceries, making food at home (easier to shop groceries for 2+ people). A dual income household in SF with good career trajectories can easily put you in the half-a-mil a year range.
It's the kids that make this infinitely more difficult. At that point I'd probably consider moving to a lower COL place. But I'm not sure I want kids - that's a decision for later.
As much as people love to knock on SF, I have a great life here and so do so many others. It's absolutely possible if you're a decent software engineer which is the lens through which I write this comment. Obviously if you're making $60k a year in a commoditized career, you're going to have a bad time. Also if home ownership is that important to you for some reason, then SF probably isn't the place for you either.
I have friends who live in Baltimore and make over $200k+ as software engineers. One guy likes to be thrifty so he bought a house for $150k because it was cheaper than renting. You can't tell me that he would be better off in SF. He would need to be making over $300k to be in a similar financial position. No Startup is going to pay him that kind of money.
I agree the weather is often nice and I love visiting SF but that's a non financial reason.
If he values home ownership, then Baltimore is much better situation for him for sure. If he doesn't, then it becomes much more of a tossup at that point and more variables come into play.
I don't know if that's more common in SF than else where and/or how lucky I was, my only point is it's good to know what's really being compared.
they give you a yearly bonus and they give you some kind of equity. They do this because it's what the local competition for employees requires.
So ... to reiterate ... the person I was replying to seemed to only be looking at salaries. You need to compare total comp not just salaries
Facebook started on a classic LAMP stack.
I’m sure they have lots of difficult problems. And I’m also sure they have a lot of run-of-the-mill problems.
I've often found startups (anyone and any organization really) will often present their opportunity as very one sided to an extent. "This is what we offer, this is what is required and no, you have no wiggle room here".
I've also found as I've aged and have more financial stability I'm less likely to get suckered into an arrangement that really doesn't benefit me.
Also as I've aged I am less likely to fall into the FOMO trap. (Fear of missing out.)
Just my 2 cents.
Older me: "Yes, but..."
For the first third of your life almost anyone you interact with who has authorarive power over you is also older than you. Think parents, teachers, coaches, managers etc.
A VC (or incubator mentor) will most likely have a stronger authorarive stance and feel more comfortable with younger founders. Founders will feel same with younger employees and so on down the hiring ladder.
It requires maturity and confidence to "unlink" age and authority. In a culture as driven by "macho posturing" as the Silicon Valley startup world is, this, in most cases, ain't going to happen.
Thus startups are young.
I think there's a lot to this. The young are more free with their energy and are more willing to throw it around haphazardly, everything is new to them. The older have been there done that and more adverse to wasting their time, thus more likely to only innovate when they believe they have a good idea and the means to execute on it.
On the other hand, innovation that has a more social component to it or relies more on life experiences would probably favor those who've had more opportunities to hit on the right experience to trigger their innovation.
The term "innovation" is probably too broad/generic to make any meaningful conclusions. It needs to be subcategorized to be useful in the way the article is positing. And from the sound of it, the research is using patent applications as a proxy for innovation which seems somewhat biased towards older people who understand the importance of getting all the legal ducks in a row, not to mention how many patents are anything but innovative. It also seems overly narrow since it misses lots of innovation that doesn't get codified as an invention.
What about having different responsiblities ? I would argue, younger people have less responasibilites than a older person, who on average does not like change and is less likely to change than a young person due to the pain of change.(It's very difficult to move a family across the country if you are married and have kids and I would bet on average, the older you get, the less likely you are to do so ,on average)
When I say " change" , I mean take risk.
A younger person can afford to take on risk younger in life than an older person due to age bias in hiring practices.
It used to be that fast food chains hired teenagers because they could pay them less, and in exchange the kids got to feel like adults usually for the first time, even if the environment was dubious.
Startups are running a similar game, only the skills needed are rare enough that the price tag is sky high compared to ordinary jobs, and only because there really have been a few unicorns and the calculated risk of investment in these sorts of salaries is potentially worth the gamble.
Personally I'd rather hire the guy who's already done it and have a lower risk of delivery, but I find that much of the management layer in tech just want someone who'll say yes.
They don't see that they're building the wrong thing, or reinviting the wheel, but they often don't care because putting tasks in Jira and them marking them done looks like they're achieving things.
The great advantage of youth is that there are endless possibilities you can be molded into. Which is probably something SV investors look for.
> youth [...] can be molded
Older people tend to ask why before jumping and offers their past experience (e.g. gravity... )
On the other hand, law 25 years ago is fairly similar to law now.
I'm now over thirty and expect a big desk, two computers, free fresh coffee, free lunch and a real paycheck. Can't build a start-up with that kind of requirements.
Every company I work for now is absolutely groaning under the weight of bureaucracy and rules that prevent everything. You know - innovations generally don't fit in there well.
I've got a mortgage. I care about getting fired over a technicality. So if you've got rules that stifle innovation then you won't see innovation.
Amazingly, I do see young people in the company doing stuff, and being applauded by management. Those things ALSO break ALL of the rules. Management doesn't care.
Ethically though I have a problem with breaking the rules just because I think I will get away from it. I'd rather they get rid of the damned rules. I guess I'm bitter that way and that bitterness has grown with age. When I was young I laughed at rules.
The huge difference between being young and old(er) is you have a so much more to lose. When I was young all I had to lose was my dignity, today I have a wife, children, house, and security.
I can’t complain in anyway as I have been very successful and answer to nobody but myself. Despite all of this I still miss the raw and angry innovation of my younger self.
It's better than the alternative.
For example, a 2016 study (pdf) by the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation that looked at the demographics of over 900 individuals who have made high-value meaningful, marketable contributions to technology-heavy industries in the US.
In mathematics, for example, innovation is typically done by the young. In architecture, by the old.
Not every area of knowledge has this property. I believe the less formal theory in particular area, the more valuable adult as innovator. When there is no theory to structure experience by the way everyone does, you would need to invent your own personalized informal theory. Such a personalization is a key to unique ideas and therefore to innovation.
Though this is just one more factor, like "old rich bastards". Reality is much more complex than that.
Needs and desires change as we age, of course they do. But there's little value in placing a binary filter over this picture. The devil is in the details. Removing the nuance leads to polarised perspectives, and these turn into battle-lines.
From the comments here, it's clear that some people feel more creative in their youth, some with age. There's no right or wrong. It varies by individual, circumstance, and a ton of other correlations.
Articles such as this may purport or intend to uncover interesting data and conduct useful analysis. Unfortunately (probably due editorial direction and pressure to shift units) they ultimately simply encourage ongoing polemic. Perpetuating simplified, harmful world-views does little to improve things.
This article in particular simply cherry-picks a bunch of "studies" to support a tenuous conjecture that is not closely examined. Any valid point is weakened by a lack of analysis, lack of robust questioning, and lack of constructive "what do we do with this information?" angle. Why was this piece commissioned and written? What is its value? Is there a problem here, and if so is a solution indicated?
I don't doubt that "startup culture" overly values and exploits the young. But this piece does nothing except fan the flames.
TLDR; click-bait.
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/politics/ng-interactive/2016/jun...
I could have stopped at cheap, but clever obedient monkeys demanding peanuts, throwing poo at their keyboards, is a better value proposition for a venture that has a 5% chance at success, than a higher grade simian.
Pro tip to cheap monkeys: Understand your value proposition, and get expensive fast.