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Comment by biohax2015 | Hacker News Reader

biohax2015

Yeah, thinking about MD school. It doesn't seem like tech is a long-term sustainable career.

I feel like this might be the valley monoculture in play.

Counter example: I lead a software team doing new product development for a multi billion company NOT in the valley. Plenty of my engineering coworkers are grandparents. They are very much comfortably employed.

My boss is 50ish, young at heart and a brilliant software architect. He still gets actively recruited and has no end of companies approaching him for contracting gigs outside of work.

Find a niche and stay effective. You'll probably be employable forever.

I live in the Midwest - it's absolutely Valley people convinced the tech world outside the Valley is either the same, or cavemen banging on C64s. Age isn't a detriment here, but you do have to be willing to work for established companies that don't operate on hipster frameworks.

> you do have to be willing to work for established companies that don't operate on hipster frameworks.

Well, one man's established company and non-hipster framework is another man's cave and commodore 64.

I've personally experienced a glaring cultural and technical difference between work environments in the SF/Seattle areas and ones in other technology hotspots - even within the same company.

> I've personally experienced a glaring cultural and technical difference between work environments in the SF/Seattle areas and ones in other technology hotspots

I'd be interested to hear about these if you had the time.

On the other hand those jobs generally pay poorly and come with extremely diminished job opportunities, room to learn and apply new things, and are in areas that are more conservative and frequently actively hostile to differences. Outside the valley isn't a wasteland but it's also not really comparable.

how much advancement do you think you'll want in your 50s? also I think it's funny that you mention intolerancia to differences in a thread about svs ageism

How many of these people do you think would self-identify as 'mediocre'?

One of the most important words in the OP's sentence is 'mediocre.' Of course great engineers will be in demand, regardless of age. But the big push towards CS education today is going to bear fruit in 10 years, at which point, wages and opportunities for older, less talented workers will decline.

I'm seeing this already among my older peer group. Even in a what is seen to be a tight job market, they are having to interview much, much more often to get even one offer.

The only reason wages for software developers are going to decline in the next 10 years is the move towards vocational schools (bootcamps) and increased popularity of university CS schools flooding the job market.

Software engineers are in this really sweet spot. They are a scarce high-skill asset and if you aren't pulling in above industry average wages you should be hopping to the next job that will pay you more.

I know so many 60-something engineers. Maybe they're not valued in the bay area, but out in the real world there are lots of 'em. Yes it may get harder to find a job at a hip new startup. Lots of boring but well-paying companies, however, are more open-minded.

By the time you are the age that it's a problem, the social environment will be too different to be predictable.

Good call. I've given it serious thought also.

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