My theory on why the job market has literally become a nightmare
Skeleton Crews. Companies realized they could get by with the bare minimum, or as they say, "run on fumes." Why hire four people when you can work one person to the bone for the same salary? It's a pure profit-and-loss calculation. Keeping the team small means the work gets done (barely), the mental pressure on the employee skyrockets, and the top executives get their fat bonuses. And they will continue this for as long as possible.
Ghost jobs and PPP loans. Remember the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans? They were supposed to help companies keep paying people's salaries. But a large portion of this money was pocketed by business owners, and then the loans were forgiven. One of the loopholes for loan forgiveness was that the company had to be "trying" to hire people. So they started posting job ads they had no intention of filling.
This is a big reason why you might apply to 100 places and hear nothing back, or see the same job ad reposted for six months. It was simply a massive wealth transfer. Then you have the mass layoffs. Suddenly, the market was flooded with very experienced people, people with 15+ years of experience. Many of them are desperate and willing to take a much lower salary just to keep their households afloat. So that junior position you're applying for? You're now competing with someone who has ten more years of experience than you. This gives companies all the power to be ridiculously picky, searching for that mythical unicorn employee who will work for pennies and never complain.
"Everyone is hiring." Oh, please. They mean the soul-crushing retail and fast-food jobs where the salary barely covers rent. They're not talking about stable office jobs with good benefits. And let's be honest, even those places that are "hiring" are also running on skeleton crews.
The Fed wants unemployment to rise. The official narrative is that if people don't have jobs, they can't spend money, which is supposed to reduce inflation. Powell even talked about the need to "discipline labor." But they conveniently ignore that large corporations are making record profits. Some estimates suggest that about 65% of recent inflation was just corporate greed in raising prices, not due to increased costs. But of course, anything is better than taxing the very rich, right? I'm sure that "trickle-down economics" theory is about to kick in any day now.
The war on Work From Home (WFH). All the pressure to get people back to the office is another part of the picture. We had years of data proving that WFH increases productivity and makes people happier. It was a huge win. But suddenly, it "isn't working" and we all need to go back to "collaborate" in the office again. The real story is that some heavy hitters have massive investments in commercial real estate. If these towers and offices empty out, they'll lose a fortune. Local governments also lose tax revenue from employees who used to buy expensive lunches downtown. Forcing people to Return To Office (RTO) is about propping up these investments, not increasing productivity. And so many people are quitting their jobs altogether rather than giving up the quality of life they gained. I was personally removed from a hiring process just for asking about their remote work policy. That's the situation. The demand for remote work is enormous, but companies are pretending not to notice.
I know there are other factors involved, but this is what I've been able to piece together from everything I see and read. It's a total mess out there. I'd like to hear what you all think, or if there's a big piece I'm missing.