It never was a lifetime career, if you don't get the dough by 35 you just failed.

i'm about 35 and i have made good money but not enough to quit. i plan on just sitting around cashing checks for another decade. with a few liquidity events along the way to sweeten the deal. should pay for my mortgage, some home renos, and fund my 401k etc. i don't foresee myself being out of work (and i don't even use AI to code! i'm just Actually Good!)

Absolutely untrue, you could have a solid career writing back office or internal software in financial services, insurance, higher ed, any number of industries. Would they make you a millionaire? No. But they'd pay for a nice house in the suburbs and raising a family.

I started at age 39 though and did pretty well up until a year or two ago (16 years total).

Like many people I've been sad about the loss of a career I spent years developing skills in and I'm 55 now and won't be quickly retraining for another high paying career. Fortunately I do have other skills I developed earlier in life and low needs so will probably limp by fine but it's still a painful adjustment.

Point being, you could always write code as an older person. Well, back in the old days when we wrote code anyway.