But I feel like the youngish folks reading hacker news (self included), especially those that get wrapped up in youth-worship and pseudo-libertarianism (not me) should ask themselves, what will we do at 65? It's a fairly uncomfortable question in our field. Whatever the reason we should not tolerate the factors that push older people out, or make excuses for doing so.
Do what you love. If you're good at it and willing to compromise reasonably, then the market will accept you. If you're not good at it you will have trouble sustaining a career for the simple reason that "junior" hires are made with the hope that the employee will improve; that prospect seems much dimmer for middle-aged candidates.
And the willingness to compromise is important too. If you are focused on a very narrow field, you may find it dissolve due to technological progress and market conditions. If you are focused on progression inside a single large employer, you may find its culture doesn't want senior hackers. Be broad, be flexible.
(To put it flippantly: I live in L.A. People who "do what they love" without being good at it are the ones who bring food to my table. I don't mean that in a derogatory way - I just wish they took their actual talents and ran with them.)
Again, there are other factors in play, but mastery is definitely important. I love running, I run everyday, but I'll never be a professional runner because I lack the skill and determination required to be a master runner. I don't even know if I'll ever be a master at anything, but I do know there are areas where I have a decent shot at it, so I know where to spend my precious time.
In the case of developers it may mean that you never become a master at programming, but what's more important: solving a problem or having elegant, well documented non-solutions?
Hackers make things work, and I think that's more important than being a "master" - I don't even like the word master, it almost feels egotistical.
A master of his art has the time to design not just his solution, but the task itself, and the experience to understand all the implications of a given solution.
And the issue is not finding people who don't enjoy what they're good at. I agreed that that might be quite rare. (Although there are definitely moments in every career where you hate what you do. It's inevitable)
It's that people abandon something they do enjoy, because it is not what they think they love. It's easy to love from afar, when you have only a passing knowledge. The hard work is keeping the love alive once you get intimate knowledge, in relationships as well as in jobs. So if you start with something you do well, you start with something you already know intimately. It's much easier to keep that working for you than building a new relationship, so to speak.
Some people will happily choose to wait tables in order to do what they love. Ain't freedom grand?
Fortunately it's a choice most of us get to make. If you're good at something, but hate doing it, you can still do it for the money. If you suck at something, and love doing it, you can do it anyway and suffer financially (and perhaps get better at it and then make money). It's a question of priorities.
I'd encourage that effort as a part of what is actionable on the scale of a single person.
It can be very difficult to see across generational lines (or, specifically, it was difficult for me) unless you interact with people who are neither your parents, grand-parents, bosses, employees, or children...
At the point in my life where I'm financially set for life and ready to move on, I plan to become a pilot in some capacity. Probably not for a traditional carrier, but maybe for sightseeing around NYC, or aerial photography. Aside from technology, flying is my other passion. I'm just not pursuing it commercially because it's a terrible career (salaries start at $20k, and you have to go through security every day. yuck!).
I'll tell you something, you young whippersnapper. There are lots of 45, 55, and yes even 65 year olds out there who can kick your youthful athletic brain's ass, any day of the week, every day of the week.
People like, say, Martin Odersky (54). Simon Peyton Jones (55). Xavier Leroy (45).
Don't worry. Keep learning. Stay interested.
Set for life isn't necessarily permanent.
Also, for the record, both Martin and SPJ are incredibly active and probably eternally young.
Example: http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/lists/laureates_ages/...
I want to add that we all have the ability to build on our own. If a company is stupid enough to fire a good engineer for being older, that engineer has the world as his or her playground thereafter. Build something amazing, start a company, do contract work, teach, etc. I'm admittedly a biased advocate of taking matters into your own hands whenever possible.
A lot of people got wiped out in the dot.com debacle, too highly invested in technology, not enough diversity, the need to eat while the portfolio was at its lowest value. Some people have pursued dreams into new ventures, poured their accumulated net worth into those endeavors and had them not succeed. Some folks have developed medical conditions associated with working long hours in a repetitive environment, or working with components that internally were quite toxic and sometimes externally, and spent their accumulated savings on ever increasing health care. Some folks have spent their excess cash on maintaining an image or a lifestyle which they perceive to be the model of success. Some folks have spent all their income on a combination of their own needs and those of their former spouses and children.
Being an engineer/programmer doesn't make you immune to life's ups and downs. And there is no magic 'pension' that kicks in (under funded or not) after you've put in 15, 20, or even 40 years at your job.
That said, I know a number of people who are both financially independent and working 30 to 60 hrs a week for someone else. They just like the work.
Life throws you plenty of curveballs, but with the skills people in this industry possess it seems to me you can make choices that enable you to be secure in doing what you love as long as you want, and you shouldn't have to worry about what happens when you age, financially. Or at least as much as anyone can. We could all be wiped out by the next banking crisis, or debt crisis, or asteroid or car crash. There are plenty of variables you can control, including how much you spend maintaining an image or lifestyle or living in an expensive locale such as the Bay area or caring for your personal fitness and diet.