I have asked these questions in interviews like these and truly -- I get straight-up blatantly illegal discriminatory answers based on age and experience level. It's as though these interviewers have no idea that we have laws against discrimination in the US, and I'm guessing because they are not properly trained in hiring practices/we just don't hold companies accountable for discrimination like we should. This has happened to me four times in the past year alone. Even worse, it has happened to my over 40, African American friend and colleague many more times than that in the past year even though he has a CS degree and experience in teaching code with modern languages. He can't get a dev job, despite his ability to code and teach it and document it well. He's a published writer to boot. They always ask him in interviews why he has not worked as a dev (outside his own projects) at a company... why has he only taught coding? Of course the unvoiced answer goes a little something like this: "well, because companies tend to hire devs according to what is more politely known as "culture-fit", and I just don't seem to "fit the current culture", if you know what I mean." He just needs a job, any job, working in his field or adjacent to it in any way. For three years, he has looked as though it was his more-than-full-time job. (of course then the question is-- what have you been doing outside these side-projects and the unspoken answer is: "interviewing, if I get lucky enough to get an interview, with anyone who will hire me every waking moment of the past three years, when I'm not doing side-projects to make it look like I'm doing something time-consuming and deep and meaningful for no money." He went through his savings doing side-projects and applying to jobs. He's about to be homeless. He recently went after technical writing positions instead of dev roles hoping the age and race thing would be less of an issue. It was ridiculous: he applied at a well-known hosting company for a tech writer job. They put him through his paces with a take home of ridiculous scope/length (for free, as you do). He politely and squarely nailed it. They wrote him back telling him he didn't get to advance because he made a mistake in his directions and they didn't do what he said they did. This was outrageously incorrect. It makes a person want to scream. Instead of being outraged and screaming out the window like in the movie Network, he wrote them back in the most gracious way possible and explained how he understood how their mistake can easily get made by anyone, (not really, but ok, he was being nice) and why his direction was in fact correct and that as a result, he hoped to meet them in person soon, as he was eager to discuss "how he could help over at XYZ" or similar. (this after two phone interviews with them worried he might be overqualified for an associate role there, during which he assured him that the pay would be great, and that he's be happy to write documentation at any level and help in any way he could--). Well, guess what? They wrote back to thank him for alerting them to their ridiculous error, stating that they would change the assignment for future candidates based upon his gracious and clear suggestions (pretty much the definition of his effective technical writing helping them at their company right there). They then explained that he didn't do some other piddling aspect of the writing that if it were an actual compaint, could be solved by a team conversation on preferences. (but the crit was actually untrue in a concrete way, just like the above) Anyway, they let him know that they would not be inviting him to the on-site.

Neither one of us can get hired anywhere despite multiple degrees and experience in engineering and in other fields. We are both over 40 and unemployable. Can't get jobs at Trader Joe's bagging groceries (and other unskilled labor, yes- have tried very hard)... overqualified, you see. Maybe we should try for a job in neurosurgery? Neither one of us has experience in that field...