Tell HN: The ratio of wants-to-be-hired to is-hiring is at a record high 0.94

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It's depressing, as if I would be looking for a job now, I'd rather look for non-tech job that is paying less than selling my knowledge so cheap.

Alternatively I'd go off the market completely and use any safety nets I've been paying massive amounts of tax for years.

Maybe I'm just lucky. But for anyone else looking - chin-up, I think there are more opportunities out there still.

Many of us, myself included, already did that. I had to wear a mask to do my "morning commute" to get coffee, but otherwise my 9-5 was mostly the same.

In my area, many businesses outside of the tech sector is actively hiring and can't find enough people. I think Covid triggered a demographic shift with many Boomers retiring (or dying) and that gap has not been filled.

Is it? Unemployment is still incredibly low and labour shortages continue to be reported.

No 0.94 is a sample that comes with a huge margin or error.

It very well could be that the actual ratio is that there are more programmers then jobs.

I would definitely not read that from the data. I don’t know what percentage of current seekers post in the wants-to-be-hired thread, but as a potentially-outlying anecdote, I didn’t until I had already been looking for three months.

I would hypothesize that there’s a psychological barrier to posting in WWTBH, even if you’ve been laid off and have no current employer you wouldn’t want seeing it – there’s a certain vulnerability in putting yourself out there versus privately applying to jobs. For me, it took a certain level of desperation with my search to make the jump from browsing the hiring thread to finally posting in the other thread this month.

IMO this is the biggest factor causing the slowdown in tech hiring. Right now people just want to stay put wherever they are. In the past when someone jumps to another company, it opens a headcount where they were, which gets filled with someone who also jumped another company, which caused a headcount to be created there, ad infinitum causing a constant cacophony of job postings, like a "velocity" of jobs akin to velocity of money.

The combination of slack in the system (unemployed people being hired), low attrition, and some backfills not being done creates a giant dampener on the velocity.

The languages in demand change is probably more interesting. Less react positions, rails holding strong, python over taking, first time no php jobs offered.

I am sure that there is a huge margin of error. I have been looking a job for 5 months. Granted, I have not used Who's hiring threads religiously and I am sure that there are positions that I applied where something with better qualifications was chosen.

Which means, if you're employed and looking elsewhere, you have to be comfortable with your employer potentially discovering your eye is wandering. Which I for one, definitely wouldn't want to do right now.

So I imagine the WWTBH posts are really just the tip of the iceberg (there may be more than one employed person looking for every unemployed one that feels comfortable posting there)

Compared to the Who is Hiring posts which companies have no reason to be concerned about posting (well, maybe if they're simultaneously laying off and pretending that they need to reduce headcount when it's really about reducing the average wage)

He rapidly left -- maybe 6-9 months? -- but got a job nonetheless.

I have the impression that who’s hiring is an excellent place to put yourself out there, though. I had a lot of exciting leads (a few of which I still follow because I liked the people I interviewed with and what they were building).

I never got contacted. For me, I assume it’s because every employer in SV is overloaded with candidates and doesn’t need to seek them out on HN. (I work in the bay)

It doesn't take into account who currently has a job.

Edit, found it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24038518#24042409

(It was about 3.5 years ago in my case, but presumably it still works today.)

1. Choose industries you like (fintech, hospitality, consumer, whatever) 2. There are ~5 or so VCs in each industry that are absolutely leaders 3. Often these VCs have roles for "Platform" or "Portfolio services" 4. Message that person (I like twitter for this over LinkedIn and even over email), sell yourself. 5. Usually this can result in an email that is sent to the entire portfolio telling them you're looking.

https://jobs.demandcurve.com/

https://www.mkt1.co/marketers

Both were with large, well-known companies. But the nature and outcome of the two were quite different. In one, the interviewer just dumped some code on the screen that had been clumsily obfuscated, and its intent and strategy rendered indecipherable.

In the second, I was asked to provide code that did something, and then add an additional feature to it on demand. This is much more in line with what I expected, and to me more valid. And the whole interview was far more satisfying and invigorating.

The first interview was so disappointingly “douchey Leetcode” that I dreaded all that would follow. It created conflicting feelings of, “I’m kind of over this type of work anyway; this may be a beneficial tipping point” vs. “I don’t want to wuss out and run away from uncomfortable experiences.”

Now that I’ve had two opposing experiences in technical interviews, I feel more confident in judging their validity and my role in their outcomes… and calling out ones that are disrespectful.

I think if you're a FAANG employer that is considered "safe" definitely yes, but there's a pile of zombie companies that have been wrecked by end of ZIRP and have a hard time understanding how they retain or hire anyone.

If the central banks are going to stick to their declared purpose of keeping this around 2% we're still in for further rate hikes, I would imagine.

* https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/core-inflation-ra...

* https://tradingeconomics.com/euro-area/core-inflation-rate

I know it's not within the desired behaviour on HN to simply write "thank you!", and I hope I did provide a bit more than just that. That being said: Thank you! Also to ed_balls and madcaptenor for collecting data in the other thread.

Then, one week later, you realize the number of posts is back to an ok level (even improving)