Even if you're in your 50s, you have to acknowledge that eventually you're going to tire out just by how our biological mechanisms wear out. Hopefully, you have a nest egg of sorts by then. And if you don't, well you can't do the job and according to your standards, be kicked/compensated less.

> If you can (and will) do the job, you should be welcomed, respected, and rewarded without regard to age, race, gender, degree, veteran status, parenthood, height, weight, or any of 100 other irrelevant characteristics.

I used to think in this way, that everything should be pure merit. Unfortunately reality doesn't work that way, inputs and rewards are hard to quantify, and the pareto principle exists. Eg. Your work powering millions, yet you're only paid a month's salary and have to meet next month's expense. Furthermore, if things are left to pure meritocracy you'd have more and more in-groups and imbalance. So in some sense you'll be doing society a favor by uplifting others that are not part of the in-group of meritocracy purists.