Via TSS, I found this excellent post. Unfortunately, while I appreciate the sentiment (hell, I'm not so young and commitment-free no more), I'm simply not convinced that these things are actually myths. Sure, age discrimination sucks, I guess, and I'd like them to be myths, but is it really a myth that:
Older software developers are less able to perform the arduous tasks of software development (read: work long, painful hours) because of family commitments and other attachments that younger workers don’t have.
Or that:
Older software developers are more jaded and cynical and therefore, less desirable in the workplace than younger ones. Younger developers are more enthusiastic than older ones.
C'mon, let's give these young snippets their due! Lots of young guys really are smart, hard-working and enthusiastic. And their crazy ideas are much too often shot down by experienced, but clueless, people in more senior roles.
Sure, there's lots of reasons to want some more level-headed folks floating around the project somewhere, but you're going to have to do more than simply assert that these things are myths before I'm going to drop my (totally-based-on-personal-experience-so-take-it-with-a-grain-of-salt) belief that younger folks are, on average, more productive than older folks.
And now let me flip this around a bit: is the incredible salary discrimination (5x, or more) against younger developers really defensible?
