The cool thing with EE is, in a lot of cases, the older you get, the more in demand you become (or at least, not any less wanted), since experience is so crucial in EE.
With CS, it seems like every company's looking for young, energetic undergrads fresh out of college who know the latest technologies, in many cases to replace the older people. It's always seemed a little too short-sighted to me... not sure how my generation of CS majors is going to do in the long term.
Don't overlook the fact that a lot of times the reason they want to hire younger folks is because they are much more likely to tolerate working insane hours and being on call 24/7. Due to their enthusiasm, lifestyle (often single with no kids), lack of experience, etc. And many companies still think that a coder who works 100 hours a week is obviously better than one who only works 40, or god forbid, 15.
It comes back around though. Currently there is a severe shortage of COBOL developers, and they are commanding very good salaries. Many major corporations and banks still use it. Today's cutting-edge is tomorrow's underdocumented legacy codebase mess to clean up.
They tend to recruit a lot of youngsters because coding-jobs are typically low on the CS ladder and don't forcibly attract people with more experience (that's a general statement, I perfectly know that specialized coding can get extremely lucrative).
"not sure how my generation of CS majors is going to do in the long term"
The way to bet is "very badly", and if you're a conventional salaried employee have your exit strategy well in place by the time you hit 35. Expect to be conventionally unemployable at 40, unless you can hide your age.
The way to bet is "very badly", and if you're a conventional salaried employee have your exit strategy well in place by the time you hit 35. Expect to be conventionally unemployable at 40, unless you can hide your age.
29. I don't expect "conventional employment", as defined by VC-istan or the corporate megaliths, in 11 years. Those will exist, but I don't think they'll be where the exciting action is.
But yes, if you're applying for subordinate positions that any idiot can fill, and you're 40+, you did something wrong. You don't need to be a manager by 40, but you need to be at a level of skill where it's obvious that you don't need traditional "here's work, go do it" management.
With CS, it seems like every company's looking for young, energetic undergrads fresh out of college who know the latest technologies, in many cases to replace the older people. It's always seemed a little too short-sighted to me... not sure how my generation of CS majors is going to do in the long term.