[GeneralMayhem]

This is true if you require the same amount of income to maintain your lifestyle, but if you've been working in tech for 20 years, you have savings. I'm not in my 40s yet, but it's much more viable for me to take a risk now than it was when I was just starting out because I can afford to fail for a couple years without, you know, becoming homeless.

[epolanski]

This so much.

I'm 36 and I can afford to not work for many years with my savings.

It's definitely easier now for me.

[nerdponx]

I wish. My savings are all going to go into a house, kids' college, and my retirement. Not everyone on HN is making $300-500k TC for a decade before having their first child.

[satvikpendem]

Using savings when younger can significantly increase your overall retirement age. There, however, is also a risk of not starting a company in time (or having enough time to complete and perhaps exit a business) by waiting until you are fully retired. How one wants to slice that risk to reward ratio is up to them. My option is the higher parent's one, starting side hustles until slowly they take over my main income, such that I feel no loss of quality of life and I'd still retire when I want to. It is akin to rolling green-blue deployments rather than shut-down-the-server deployments.

[ed_mercer]

While I also consider myself lucky, not everyone works as a software engineer earning high salaries. Being older also (usually) means more responsibilities and less tolerance for risk.

[epolanski]

Very true, I think that while my savings are very good, I would have much less risk tolerance if I had kids.

[swah]

I wish we had an online space for talking to people with these concerns. Its much different for a single guy - he can make his 100k savings last years, specially if allowed to go back living with family.

[comatory]

You can do this if you're in US, salaries elsewhere for tech jobs are more inline with salaries for specialized professions (doctors, lawyers). They're still larger than other jobs but it goes nowhere near the levels of western/eastern US (exceptions exist ofc).

Then there's a question when you start a family, that's subjective and something you can control but the model of creating career and then having kids (in late 30s/early 40s) seems more common in US. If you have your first child in mid 30s, then few laters 2nd one for example, you still need to be very hands-on, attentive and provide at least until your late 40s/early 50s.