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Over the Hill in Silicon Valley

26/06/2014

BBC World Service - Assignment, Over the Hill in Silicon Valley

The median age in many Silicon Valley tech firms is 29. Is Silicon Valley ageist?

The median age in many Silicon Valley tech firms is 29 years. So where does that leave older workers trying to join the technology revolution? Is Silicon Valley ageist?

Silicon Valley is the global hub for e-commerce and for much of the world's technological innovation. You might also call it the world's most successful micro-climate of free enterprise: investors in California's Bay Area seem to have a special knack for picking winners - from Microsoft and Apple to Facebook and Google. 

Yet rumblings are afoot, as critics point to a growing obsession with youth. To be successful, they say, you need to be fresh out of a college engineering degree, and a total workaholic. Those over 30 need not apply. So is Silicon Valley ageist?  

For Assignment, the no longer totally youthful, Ed Butler has been to California to find out.

(Photo: An office building in East Palo Alto, Silicon Valley California. Credit: Shutter Stock)

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