The 20-year-old is, maybe, just like you at that age: eager and smart, but lacking experience. Making bad decisions, bad designs, bad implementations left and right. Just like you did, way back when.

But you have made all those mistakes already. You've learned, you've earned your experience. You are much more valuable than you think.

Source: Me, I'm almost 60, been programming since I was 12.

I think the idea of meritocracy has died in me. I wish I could be rewarded for my knowledge and expertise, but it seems that capitalism, as in maximizing profit, has won above everything else.

You are rewarded for something that is useful to the market, i.e. to other people (useful enough so they agree to pay you money for it). If something you know is no longer useful, you will not be rewarded.

It was true 100 years ago, it was true 20 years ago, and it is true now.

It's good advice, but not easy to follow, since knowing what to do and doing it are very different things.

I think that what he means is that how successful we are in work is closely related to our contributions, or to the perceived "value" we bring to other people.

The current gen AI isn't the end of programmers. What matters is still what people want and are willing to pay for and how can we contribute to fulfill that need.

You are right that young folks have the time and energy to work more than older ones and for less money. And they can soak up knowledge like a sponge. That's their strong point and older folks cannot really compete with that.

You (and everyone else) have to find your own strong point, your "niche" so to speak. We're all different, so I'm pretty sure that what you like and are good at is not what I like and I'm good at and vice-versa.

All the greats, like Steve Jobs and so on said that you've got to love what you do. Follow your intuition. That may even be something that you dreamed about in your childhood. Anything that you really want to do and makes you feel fulfilled.

I don't think you can get to any good place while disliking what you do for a living.

That said, all this advice can seem daunting and unfeasible when you're not in a good place in life. But worrying only makes it worse.

If you can see yourself in a better light and as having something valuable to contribute, things would start looking better.

This is solvable. Have faith!

> All the greats, like Steve Jobs and so on said that you've got to love what you do.

This is probably true for them but the other thing that can happen is that when you take what you love and do it for work or try to make it a business you can grow to hate it.

I guess it also depends on how much you love your work. If there wasn't that much interest in the first place, I suppose you can grow to hate it in time. If that happens, maybe there's something else you'd rather do instead?

?? Not sure what you mean. Carmack's advice is not specific to any particular point in your career. You can enact the principle he's talking about just as much with 30 YOE as you can with 2. It's actually easier advice to follow for older people than younger, since they have seen more of the world and probably have a better sense of where the "rough edges" are. Despite what you see on twitter and HN and YC batches, most successful companies are started by people in their 40s.

> How can I compete with a 20 something years old who has sharper memory, more free time (due to lack of obligations like family/relationships),

Is it a USA/Silicon Valley thing to miss the arrogance and insufferability most fresh grads have when entering the workforce?

It's kind of tone-deaf to attempt to self-victimize as someone with significant work experience being concerned of being replaced by a demographic that is notoriously challenged to build experience.