Disconnect between official job data and people's experience on the job market?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is a saying that a recession is when your neighbor loses their job, and a depression is when you lose your job.

Evaluation of the job market is similar. If you are personally having trouble finding work it is hard to understand that the overall job market might not be terrible.

This is a terrific and easy-to-understand explanation. Success or failure of the current job market is relative depending on who you ask and where they are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is a saying that a recession is when your neighbor loses their job, and a depression is when you lose your job.

Evaluation of the job market is similar. If you are personally having trouble finding work it is hard to understand that the overall job market might not be terrible.

This is a terrific and easy-to-understand explanation. Success or failure of the current job market is relative depending on who you ask and where they are.

Only if people are too stupid to look at the actual data to understand the broader picture which I guess is probably a lot of people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think if you’re in the non-profit/government fields, it’s not good. Basically anything touching federal money that isn’t defense or homeland security. But a lot of industries are doing fine.

As someone who works in the above field, I’m surrounded by people struggling. But then I talk to my extended family members who are electricians, construction project managers, physician specialists, etc. and they feel little insecurity right now.

I'm surprised. Those professions need clients, and the pool of people who have money available to hire them is shrinking. They also have to deal with the same rising prices all of us do. Construction, especially, I would expect to have a lot of difficulty with pricing in their supply chain.

Yep, new construction is slowing a lot. Even if these folks aren’t hurting now, they will be in a couple months when they finish their current projects.

[Anonymous]

I am a manager in IT, and I received over 3800 resumes for an IT position five days after posting the job. That's just insane.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am a manager in IT, and I received over 3800 resumes for an IT position five days after posting the job. That's just insane.

Serious question…how many are North Koreans or Chinese applying or AI bots that just spam the inbox?

Put another way, what % do you think are real people in the US?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am a manager in IT, and I received over 3800 resumes for an IT position five days after posting the job. That's just insane.

Honestly, we should just have people apply in person at this point. Then you only get serious candidates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a manager in IT, and I received over 3800 resumes for an IT position five days after posting the job. That's just insane.

Honestly, we should just have people apply in person at this point. Then you only get serious candidates.

That would get pretty expensive and time consuming. I recently got a fully remote position and had applied to several others. I couldn’t have flown all over the US to apply in person.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is a saying that a recession is when your neighbor loses their job, and a depression is when you lose your job.

Evaluation of the job market is similar. If you are personally having trouble finding work it is hard to understand that the overall job market might not be terrible.

This is a terrific and easy-to-understand explanation. Success or failure of the current job market is relative depending on who you ask and where they are.

Only if people are too stupid to look at the actual data to understand the broader picture which I guess is probably a lot of people.

99% of people’s perception of “the economy” is vibes based.

[Anonymous]

I would imagine that the disconnect between the perceptions and the numbers are about:
1) different jobs are available from what job seekers want
2) unhappy people (job seekers finding it difficult) talk more than happy people (job seekers not finding it difficult
3) regional mismatch in job availability v jib seekers
4) still some delay in jobs reports for job loses related to federal govt and tariffs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am a manager in IT, and I received over 3800 resumes for an IT position five days after posting the job. That's just insane.

+1 I make hiring decisions for a small tech consulting firm and we're getting people that we never could have hired before. Our pay scale is not impressive (we used to hire first year graduates and lose them predictably at the one year mark when they had something on their resume and could jump ship for more money) but now we're getting very qualified applicants who wouldn't have even accepted an interview with us two or three years ago.

I also don't think "hospitality" is doing well as an upthread PP opined. Have you seen the videos of Vegas - it's a ghost town, and this is during vacation season. US tourism is being absolutely decimated.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a manager in IT, and I received over 3800 resumes for an IT position five days after posting the job. That's just insane.

Honestly, we should just have people apply in person at this point. Then you only get serious candidates.

That would get pretty expensive and time consuming. I recently got a fully remote position and had applied to several others. I couldn’t have flown all over the US to apply in person.

I assume you knew someone to shepherd your resume?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a manager in IT, and I received over 3800 resumes for an IT position five days after posting the job. That's just insane.

+1 I make hiring decisions for a small tech consulting firm and we're getting people that we never could have hired before. Our pay scale is not impressive (we used to hire first year graduates and lose them predictably at the one year mark when they had something on their resume and could jump ship for more money) but now we're getting very qualified applicants who wouldn't have even accepted an interview with us two or three years ago.

I also don't think "hospitality" is doing well as an upthread PP opined. Have you seen the videos of Vegas - it's a ghost town, and this is during vacation season. US tourism is being absolutely decimated.

Vegas is getting hammered because it usually has a ton of international visitors, most importantly Canadians, that are staying away from the US. It also has gotten crazy expensive, which is why I may live it up when I attend industry conferences, but would never go on my own nickel.

The best months are usually September and October when conference season is in full swing. If those months suck, then it's going to really impact Vegas.

NYC hospitality is going gangbusters since they outlawed most AirBnBs.

[Anonymous]

Trump just fired the BLS head ... so don't worry, next jobs report will be champagne and roses and we'll wondering even more about the disconnect.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a manager in IT, and I received over 3800 resumes for an IT position five days after posting the job. That's just insane.

+1 I make hiring decisions for a small tech consulting firm and we're getting people that we never could have hired before. Our pay scale is not impressive (we used to hire first year graduates and lose them predictably at the one year mark when they had something on their resume and could jump ship for more money) but now we're getting very qualified applicants who wouldn't have even accepted an interview with us two or three years ago.

I also don't think "hospitality" is doing well as an upthread PP opined. Have you seen the videos of Vegas - it's a ghost town, and this is during vacation season. US tourism is being absolutely decimated.

Vegas is getting hammered because it usually has a ton of international visitors, most importantly Canadians, that are staying away from the US. It also has gotten crazy expensive, which is why I may live it up when I attend industry conferences, but would never go on my own nickel.

The best months are usually September and October when conference season is in full swing. If those months suck, then it's going to really impact Vegas.

NYC hospitality is going gangbusters since they outlawed most AirBnBs.

Yes, friend. Thank you for spelling out what is meant by "US tourism is being absolutely decimated." International visitors are staying away from the US.

It is true that NYC hotel occupancy has not dipped from last year even though AirBnBs were mostly outlawed. The same number of people are using hotels and nobody is using AirBnBs. If you're counting on your fingers at home, that means that all the people that were using AirBnBs last year are just . . . not traveling to NYC anymore. So even with hotel occupancy staying steady (and above the US average), that stat indicates a decline in tourism.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My friends who have young adults just out of college say the market is terrible for their grads.

If recent grads aren’t whiny WTH wannabes they’ll find a job. This latest working generation is entitled and lazy.

Yawn. Every generation has been called entitled and lazy by a previous generation.

But this time it’s true.

It really is. They have no stamina. Sitting down after 30 minutes of work or need a mental health break.