I read some stats somewhere a while ago that the average for daytraders was mid 40's. Made of people who wanted to change careers.
I would expect that most people trading in an office are younger. Most of the '2nd career' folks are probably more likely to trade their own account using personal money from home. Pure guesswork not based on anything other than......well guesswork.
The traders I know are either in their 20s, or 40+. My neighbor is a retired doctor (68 yrs old) and he started to watch and trade with me about a year ago. I've never heard so many F bombs come out of a baptist's mouth! He loves it and has devoted more time to studying and learning to trade than the hours he put in as a doctor. That's what I love about this "business". You can have an MBA from Harvard, a G.E.D., come from a wealthy family or have lived off food stamps and still have the opportunity to earn a better living than 99.9% of the population.
I can totally relate to what you are saying. I lived off foodstamps til i was 18. No one would give me a job. This truly is the last leg of capitalism.
According to the SEC, most pro traders are in the 30-39 age class. Second largest group being the 20-29s. The numbers are much lower but uniformally distributed in the other ages. OHLC
I think the question should be " What is the average age of successful traders", and that you will never know.
That would be the most interesting answer to formulate, but the problem is that 50% (at least) would never put themselves in that category even if they have lost their entire account. That is swallowing your pride as a business man to declare yourself unsuccessful as a trader. IMO, that is the first step you must take to move forward. As I said in my old posts, I started at 21 years old, made some good trades (lucky... market timing) built my account up from $5K to $75K in 4 months while I was working on a bond desk making $30K/year + small bonuses, then lost all but $5K. I quit my job..... thinking, $30K base, screw this... I just made more than that in 4 months than I would in 2 years at this ridiculous job. Little did I know how much that 2 years experience would help me successfully trade my own account coupled with my other experience in 2 other firms. My decisions and "vision" (I use that word very loosely) that I have gained from these "menial" jobs that I took for granted when I was young and ignorant transpired into knowledge and experience that most 27 year olds would not have unless they went to an Ivy League school with daddy's money to trade with. I now look back at those jobs as a paid "scholarship" towards trading and market experience that most traders will literally pay out of their pocket/account to learn. I have a few friends that work for various direct access firms and they still complain how they have to put up with clients who are impossible to deal with, have no idea how the market operates, don't even know what their holding are, are intolerable if a quote is stuck or missing, ect.... you know the rest... and I say to them, do you realize you have the opportunity to watch some of the top traders in the industry as they trade live and you are bitching about a client who requested an explanation about his margin call?????? Those are the clients you WATCH and observe and monitor. LEARN from their mistakes and successes. That is free education which will save you tons on cash if you decide to trade. Maybe it's just me, since I did work for a firm a while ago and I understand the magnitude of these few opportunities to learn and educate yourself off of other client's mistakes.