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'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York

fastcompany.com

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Re: 'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York

#91

Post by probably_wrong »

weakened_malloc wrote: post #87
Aurornis wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every employer would send "We have decided not to continue with your application" once your entry in the database reaches the legally-mandated timeout period. The part you wouldn't like is the unintended consequences: Every company would be forced to use an ATS to manage applicants, and all hiring would have to be pushed through the ATS. The ATS would have some default timeout where candidates who aren't hired get th…

Or just allow what happens in the EU. Every time I've applied for a job and been rejected, I put through a GDPR request and find out the reasons I was rejected.

Which right exactly are you invoking?

Re: 'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York

#93

Post by georgemcbay »

ryandrake wrote: post #40
idle_zealot wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I know it's frustrating, but stacking laws like this doesn't get useful information out of companies but it does force the application process to revolve around demonstrating compliance with the regulations. Eh, that's like saying taxing them is pointless because they'll just spend more on accountants to find loopholes. It's only true if you have the political will to pass the laws but not enough to fund the teeth…

Exactly. I hate this mentality: "We can't possibly regulate companies, because they are so clever and they'll find loopholes and work around any law we make!" So write better laws! Add provisions for loopholes you anticipate. Add wording to remove ambiguity that the company will try to use to weasel their way out. Analyze the ways companies already get around laws and shore them up with a patch. Do something! We've t…

> We've tried one thing, and it didn't work so we're all out of ideas!

(I'm sure you're fully aware of this, but just to add on to what you're saying that I agree with...)

This is all an intentional messaging strategy for kicking the can down the road indefinitely done by people who stand to lose if things are changed for the better of the masses.

Same exact strategy is used (often by the same people) to dismiss the idea of more fair taxation and lots of other things we supposedly can't ever make any progress on because our first attempt to address an obvious problem might not be perfect.

Re: 'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York

#94

Post by engineer_22 »

danielvaughn wrote: post #13

I'd support it at the federal level. It's cruel towards people looking for work, and it costs them real time at a point in their lives when time is such a critical factor.

What is cruel about having a public mailbox for stuffing job applications?

Re: 'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York

#95

Post by Sohcahtoa82 »

ryandrake wrote: post #40
idle_zealot wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I know it's frustrating, but stacking laws like this doesn't get useful information out of companies but it does force the application process to revolve around demonstrating compliance with the regulations. Eh, that's like saying taxing them is pointless because they'll just spend more on accountants to find loopholes. It's only true if you have the political will to pass the laws but not enough to fund the teeth…

Exactly. I hate this mentality: "We can't possibly regulate companies, because they are so clever and they'll find loopholes and work around any law we make!" So write better laws! Add provisions for loopholes you anticipate. Add wording to remove ambiguity that the company will try to use to weasel their way out. Analyze the ways companies already get around laws and shore them up with a patch. Do something! We've t…

> I hate this mentality: "We can't possibly regulate companies, because they are so clever and they'll find loopholes and work around any law we make!" So write better laws! Add provisions for loopholes you anticipate. Add wording to remove ambiguity that the company will try to use to weasel their way out.

Unfortunately, that is exactly how you end up with legalese and laws that are hard for normal people to understand: because bad-faith actors will invent ambiguity, litigate definitions, and argue over the exact meaning of every word.

It's like trying to tell a child "No jumping on the bed!" and they keep doing it while insisting they're not jumping, they're hopping, and then go into a diatribe about the difference between jumping and hopping until you say something like "Do not jump, hop, bounce, spring, leap, vault, stomp, rebound, or otherwise employ your feet, legs, knees, or body weight to produce repeated or excessive vertical motion upon, across, or within the boundaries of the bed."

And then they remove the mattress from the bed, put it on the floor, and start jumping on it, and say that wasn't against the rules because you only specified the bed, and declare that a mattress on its own does not constitute a bed.

Re: 'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York

#96

Post by JumpCrisscross »

ufmace wrote: post #59
BanazirGalbasi wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Getting a rejection message, even an automated one, removes ambiguity. You're no longer wondering if you missed a call or an email went to spam, you have it right there in writing. In college, I interviewed with two different local companies that had internships that would continue as part-time positions during the year. Both interviews went well and I felt that the interaction was positive overall. I was confident t…

It's not like job searches are the only context where you can get ghosted. It happens often enough in friendships, social activities, finding romantic partners, etc.

> It happens often enough in friendships, social activities, finding romantic partners, etc.

Yet as we get older we usually get the chance to curate our surroundings such that those people aren’t around us anymore.

Re: 'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York

#97

Post by RandallBrown »

Aurornis wrote: post #27
wps wrote: post #18

In the same way that credit card companies are required to tell you the exact reasons your score has changed, companies should be required to give at least any sort of notice of rejection. Something as simple as: we have proceeded with another candidate (if and only if the role was actually filled). I know this opens up a lot of questions about enforcement and employer discrimination, but something has to be done.

Every employer would send "We have decided not to continue with your application" once your entry in the database reaches the legally-mandated timeout period. The part you wouldn't like is the unintended consequences: Every company would be forced to use an ATS to manage applicants, and all hiring would have to be pushed through the ATS. The ATS would have some default timeout where candidates who aren't hired get th…

A sensibly written law could close loopholes like the one you described.

I'm not sure an ATS would be required either. Simply having a law that requires a response when inquired about the status of an application after a certain amount of time would suffice.

I was ghosted by a Fortune 500 company after making it to the final round of an interview recently. It took me weeks of sending emails to get them to tell me they didn't want to hire me.

Re: 'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York

#98

Post by RandallBrown »

engineer_22 wrote: post #94
danielvaughn wrote: post #13

I'd support it at the federal level. It's cruel towards people looking for work, and it costs them real time at a point in their lives when time is such a critical factor.

What is cruel about having a public mailbox for stuffing job applications?

It's cruel to have people spend time and energy applying for a job that doesn't actually exist and they have no chance of being hired for, despite their qualifications.

Re: 'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York

#99

Post by erikerikson »

4MOAisgoodenuf wrote: post #65
godwinson__4-8 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doubtful you would still feel that way if it became the legally mandated norm. The reason ghosting is offensive is it feels so disrespectful and impersonal. How is some bland automated message triggered by a cron job any better? The automated message doesn't respect or care about you, no person would have put any thought into it. It would be entirely automated. If that makes you feel better it is suggestive of a deep…

The primary negative aspect of Ghost jobs (from the perspective of job applicants) is not simply that it "feels bad" but that it floods the usual channels of seeking work with garbage data. Assuming a world where there is a set of employers that would actually like to hire someone and a set of workers who are desiring employment, the set of listings that are not seeking to hire (or are only floating a job listing in…

In addition there are direct financial costs through increased unemployment insurance claim period duration.

Re: 'Ghost jobs' could soon be illegal in New York

#100

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

_DeadFred_ wrote: post #88
autoexec wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies have been using data brokers to get info on potential employees for ages in violation of the law. The law has almost zero enforcement and when something is done nobody does to prison. It's almost always just the government wanting a cut of the action. For example: https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2012/06/... https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2014/04/...

Prison is a limitation of freedom of movement. The equivalent for a company should be the limiting of movement of shares (no shares bought/sold/traded) for the duration of an imposed sentence. Since corporations are people and all, there needs to be an equivalent punishment.

Frankly, I'd just prefer really huge fines, preferably scaled as a percentage of either gross or net revenue or profit.
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