Am I too old?

[Kann]

Or just a master in financial engineering.

To take a PhD you must have a deep interrest in the subject. Its not easy to complete one.

 

[Tiasilverman]

with a master in financial engineering how many are the opportunities to get a great job in finance? Which programe do you advice me?

 

[Kann]

They are great if you get a good degree and get a good network.

There are alot of good universities with mfe degrees.

You can check the MFE ranking page on the site.

 

[Tiasilverman]

and according to you age is important? I don't know the USA reality, here in Italy there isn't future

 

[Kann]

No its not. But time is important. Don't take degrees for just having them. Take them because u want them and are geniue interrested in what they offer.

 

[C S]

Silicon Valley does.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox...tion_it_s_not_uncommon_in_silicon_valley.html

And even better:

http://anewdomain.net/2014/12/11/dont-hire-anyone-30-ageism-silicon-valley/

"Even better" in what sense? The source reads as quite biased. The first link is better, but even the example cited there... I can think of myriad other reasons than age discrimination:

"Plaintiff's supervisor made at least one critical remark about plaintiff's age," the suit alleges. "The persons defendants employ in positions similar to plaintiff's position are all substantially younger than plaintiff. Defendants replaced plaintiff with several employees in their 20's and 30's." The suit also accuses Twitter of increasing Taylor's workload to an unmanageable level after he fell ill and was treated repeatedly for kidney stones, then firing him when he failed to complete the work.
​

Generally when someone much more experienced gets replaced by several younger workers, there's just a financial consideration involved. Sure you can read the fact that everyone else in the position is much younger as age discrimination, but a common sense reading is that it doesn't actually take much experience to do that job.

 

[C S]

Age discrimination is rampant in the US based on what I've read (including some examples above). From quant finance forums I gather that it is not as bad in finance as say Silicon Valley.

I've been told I'm over the age limit for some jobs in Asia where I guess there are no laws against it.

Edit: Some jobs in Asia, not all I hope.

There's a high noise to signal ratio. Meaning, there are legitimate grievances, but often stories are based on hearsay, accusations and the wrong data (eg look how many X there are, they must be discriminating!). If you go by the noise, mathematicians are amongst the most sexist people on the planet. But having been in the mathematical community, I haven't found a group more inviting and nurturing of differences, including those of different genders.

Quants and developers make the transition between between finance and tech without age issue. Age is more likely to be an issue in certain roles, say in some junior roles in investment banking, but that could be considered a by-product of requiring someone without obligations that is able to hustle and invest copious amounts of time into the job.

There's also the "fit" aspect. For example, I was recently told that I wasn't suitable for a junior trader role because the other junior trader was a recent college grad and they didn't want to make him feel threatened. Some would call this age discrimination. But this will happen whether you're in Silicon Valley or Wall Street: many people don't want an assistant that is more experienced and knowledgable than them. Some would call that job preservation.

 

[MiloRambaldi]

There's a high noise to signal ratio. Meaning, there are legitimate grievances, but often stories are based on hearsay, accusations and the wrong data (eg look how many X there are, they must be discriminating!). If you go by the noise, mathematicians are amongst the most sexist people on the planet. But having been in the mathematical community, I haven't found a group more inviting and nurturing of differences, including those of different genders.

This is probably the most absurd thing I've ever read on this forum. Read up on some history of mathematics if you are interested in the truth.

There's also the "fit" aspect. For example, I was recently told that I wasn't suitable for a junior trader role.

Well, it was for a junior trading role, and I was told they did not want candidates over the age of 25. This is called age discrimination. I'm not complaining; just stating a tautology.

 

[TehRaio]

Generally when someone much more experienced gets replaced by several younger workers, there's just a financial consideration involved. Sure you can read the fact that everyone else in the position is much younger as age discrimination, but a common sense reading is that it doesn't actually take much experience to do that job.

There's a high noise to signal ratio. Meaning, there are legitimate grievances, but often stories are based on hearsay, accusations and the wrong data (eg look how many X there are, they must be discriminating!). If you go by the noise, mathematicians are amongst the most sexist people on the planet. But having been in the mathematical community, I haven't found a group more inviting and nurturing of differences, including those of different genders.

I tend to shy away from what one person interpretation of a situation qualifies as "common sense".
Whenever I read stories like these, some of the comments are too often predictable: Study says problem X might (or might not) be real, commentator Y argues: I don't agree on study data/conclusion based on my own experience, must/might be noise.
Beside that discussion being off topic, it's quite boring and repetitive. I prefer restraining myself from commenting on subjects when I know that my own experience (or interpretation) is possibly statistically irrelevant, and I'd like to emphasize on the statistical part here.
Also there is a difference between: I don't see it, meaning, it's not there. And I don't see it, meaning, my observation is inconclusive.
what am I trying to say here (poorly I know) is that "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence".
Your example on the mathematics community fits all this well. (I haven't read on the sexism in maths, but I did it for economics, different fields obviously.)

Quants and developers make the transition between between finance and tech without age issue. Age is more likely to be an issue in certain roles, say in some junior roles in investment banking, but that could be considered a by-product of requiring someone without obligations that is able to hustle and invest copious amounts of time into the job.

There's also the "fit" aspect. For example, I was recently told that I wasn't suitable for a junior trader role because the other junior trader was a recent college grad and they didn't want to make him feel threatened. Some would call this age discrimination. But this will happen whether you're in Silicon Valley or Wall Street: many people don't want an assistant that is more experienced and knowledgeable than them. Some would call that job preservation.

Agreed. I find it weird though, that'd be like privileging one employee over the other when you both are juniors anyway. Doesn't make much sense to me because if they're considering not hiring you because the other guy might be too mentally fragile to work with you, then maybe HE is the one not up for the job? I don't know just saying...

again, @Tiasilverman, sorry for being off topic here.

 

[Quants]

Age doesn't matter. How you learn, what do you understand, how you do, and what result is are more important !