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Ask HN: What is the job market like?

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Re: Ask HN: What is the job market like?

#31

Post by xtracto »

rdtsc wrote: post #27

US tech company. Just as the RTO excuse ended it started with AI immediately. RTO was used to squeeze as hard as possible to force people to leave and not pay severance ("You're not in the office a month from now across the country? Looks like you decided to resign, sucks for you!"). First it was "be in any office, as long as you butt is in a building with our logo on it" to "well, no, you gotta be where you manager…

>Meanwhile I got only 5 or so recruiter emails in the last year or so. Before it was a constant stream, almost one every a few weeks.

I've actually seen more and more LinkedIn posts from recruiters that [are proud of ] have been laid off themselves. You know things are bad when recruiters are the ones looking for jobs.

Re: Ask HN: What is the job market like?

#32

Post by Xunjin »

boyka wrote: post #28
tomashertus wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just guessing, Czechia? The Central European software engineering market seems to be softening as well, likely due to second-order effects from the U.S. tech layoffs and decreased demand for remote roles from SV companies.

No, he's in Switzerland. Unexpectedly, I must say, as many big tech including AI labs are expanding here

I fear when someone says which country you are so fast lol.

Re: Ask HN: What is the job market like?

#34

Post by fhd2 »

yewenjie wrote: post #25
alephnerd wrote: post #17

This gets constantly asked on HN. What matters is where you live - the hiring market in Germany or Canada is going to be different from the Bay Area or NYC.

German startups that used to be English-speaking are now asking for German. I don't understand what that solves.

I think it's primarily a filter. Candidate filters are pretty much always silly, even common ones based on degree/grades etc. But with a lot of candidates on the market, using some filters reduces the list to a manageable amount.

Personally, as someone with a German company and a good chunk of German clients, I'd argue it _does_ help a little. Occasionally. But by and large I'm far more interested in the candidate's English proficiency.

Re: Ask HN: What is the job market like?

#35

Post by [deleted] »

rdtsc wrote: post #27

US tech company. Just as the RTO excuse ended it started with AI immediately. RTO was used to squeeze as hard as possible to force people to leave and not pay severance ("You're not in the office a month from now across the country? Looks like you decided to resign, sucks for you!"). First it was "be in any office, as long as you butt is in a building with our logo on it" to "well, no, you gotta be where you manager…

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: What is the job market like?

#36

Post by teeray »

red_hare wrote: post #7
ge96 wrote: post #3

Check r/cscareerquestions ha usually blood bath for juniors eg. thousands of applications to try and land a job. r/experienceddevs too a little different vibe there but some insight on job market But hey if you don't use AI when doing an interview, might have a better leg up than those that do eg. pause for 5 seconds between responses, ear piece, looking at a screen, someone replacing you after hiring, etc...

> pause for 5 seconds between responses I'm sure I'm not the only one, but I've gotten so aggressive about monitoring for this. I do most interviews zoomed in on the candidate's eyes and I rubric on how they "thought" through the problem, not just the results. Thankfully the interview tools are catching on as well and now tracking this like browser focus, number of monitors, window size, and sending notifications whe…

I did not have Voight-Kampff tests on my 2026 hiring bingo card, but here we are.

Re: Ask HN: What is the job market like?

#37

Post by bwestergard »

Varelion wrote: post #22
MeetingsBrowser wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t know how to make the statistics match my perceived reality. Both in this thread, and people I know in real life who are looking for jobs are struggling hard. Mass layoffs are becoming more common and the time spent between jobs is measured in six month increments. And yet, the numbers say we are in a hiring market with more job openings than ever, except for during the pandemic. My perceived reality and the n…

Why would the (USA) job numbers be real? We have yes-men at every level, purposefully installed to spin any and everything in the most positive light possible. And, if not, outright fabricate numbers.

Former BLS officials still believe the numbers are reliable, because the methodology is public and there are lots of ways for well-financed actors (e.g. wall street traders) to spot manipulation.

https://www.npr.org/2025/09/05/nx-s1-5530733/bls-jobs-report...

Re: Ask HN: What is the job market like?

#38

Post by interactivecode »

rdtsc wrote: post #27

US tech company. Just as the RTO excuse ended it started with AI immediately. RTO was used to squeeze as hard as possible to force people to leave and not pay severance ("You're not in the office a month from now across the country? Looks like you decided to resign, sucks for you!"). First it was "be in any office, as long as you butt is in a building with our logo on it" to "well, no, you gotta be where you manager…

> The strange thing is this is happening in multiple companies at the same time. It's like all the CEOs and HR reps met at some golf retreat and decided to follow a script.

I’ve gotten the same feeling. It’s too consistent to be a fluke. I get the feeling its a fashion thats being pushed by VC funds who are all neck deep in nvidia, openai and anthropic stocks. They must have realized they can pump this to their portfolio to inflate all the investments.

Re: Ask HN: What is the job market like?

#39

Post by interactivecode »

itstotallykyle wrote: post #13

Been applying since January after a startup layoff and seeing mixed results. I have 14 years of experience spanning datacenter ops, Security certs, and all 3 major clouds. I’ve led hundreds of people across multiple technical disciplines. Right out of the gate, I was getting great callbacks and final rounds. Then, around April, the pipeline completely dried up. I’m doing the work for EVERY application like generating…

Wondering what happened in April, around that time layoffs started including at my job. No reason at all aside from “AI” and the C suite wanting larger profits.

Re: Ask HN: What is the job market like?

#40

Post by icedchai »

MeetingsBrowser wrote: post #15
bwestergard wrote: post #8

To go by the numbers, it's pretty good. Not as good as the truly anomalous post-pandemic peak of hiring. But still good compared to almost every other occupational group. https://www.comptia.org/en-us/resources/research/tech-jobs-r...

I don’t know how to make the statistics match my perceived reality. Both in this thread, and people I know in real life who are looking for jobs are struggling hard. Mass layoffs are becoming more common and the time spent between jobs is measured in six month increments. And yet, the numbers say we are in a hiring market with more job openings than ever, except for during the pandemic. My perceived reality and the n…

Same. I'm still employed, but am looking. I've had a few interviews but they're all for jobs I wouldn't really want. I know talented people who were laid off and have been looking for 6 to 9 months+. It's very rough out there. I've witnessed the dot-com crash, great financial crisis... this is the worst I've seen. Maybe other industries are better.
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