[nilkn]

I would amend this to say that time spent in a career represents a commodity that one can invest in oneself, and different folks invest that commodity in different ways and to different extents.

Some folks coast and fall into the category of "1 year of experience, 10 times in a row." Someone else gets more out of 2 years of working than the coasters get out of 10. In the worst case, you have a coaster who thinks they're actually in the second category.

A simple number for years of experience is very hard to interpret as a result. Take someone in the second category and give them 10 years of experience and you get someone amazing at their craft. But you have to be able to reliably discern this in the interviewing process.