Computerworld has repeatedly reported for years that there is a 20% unemployment rate among programmers over 50. Out here in the real world that looks conservative. Note they are talking about the real unemployment rate, including people that are making half what they were as admin bodies and Walmart DVD salespeople, not the fantasy unemployment rate published by the government.

Companies willing to retrain? Don't make me laugh.

Let me give you an example of what's really going on, just one little story. More than once last year, I was informed that a client had decided to hire a local individual for a contract rather than someone from out of town. I went back to the job postings; applications from H1B individuals were accepted. I called the agency back and asked them if someone getting off a plane from India or Taiwan were considered 'local' to Seattle or Cincinatti but someone from the Silicon Valley wasn't. They had no response. (By the way, there was no retraining involved, this was an HP 3000 COBOL requirement which I've been doing longer than I care to admit.)

Let me make a parenthetical comment here for the record: I am very proud of this country's history of accepting immigrants with open arms. I hope we continue to do so, but to hire a 25-year-old from overseas rather than someone that's here already just does not make sense.

The article further stated that COBOL people with Web skills are especially in demand. I've got over 20 years programming in COBOL and I'm a Certified Internet Webmaster that scored 100% on the HTML portion of the exam. Nobody's beating down my door.

In 1999 and 2000, I found 6 months of Y2K work. I finally had to take a direct position at a small company in the Southeast with the promise that I'd get some training. I've been here 6 months and have not been to one day of training and am not scheduled to do so. They are (supposedly) going to a new ERP system but Big 5 consultants are going to do the implementation while I keep the legacy systems going. Prior to Y2K, most of my contract work was in supporting legacy systems while the direct employees implemented SAP, BAAN, or whatever. Now I find myself as a direct supporting the old stuff, making half what I use to, working at least 10 more hours a week, and I can't even take a day off for a year. What's wrong with this picture? I had to sign a letter stating that I would repay relocation expenses if I quit in less than 2 years; I think they want my experience for that length of time and then they hope I leave. (By the way, I'm baseing this on a lot more than what I'm telling you here.)

If there are companies out there actually interested in people like me, I'd like to hear from them and so would a few thousand others.