Posting fake jobs should be illegal.
Ghost jobs are wreaking havoc on tech workers
241–250 of 264 posts
Re: Ghost jobs are wreaking havoc on tech workers
#242Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, just not everywhere.
So we agree it isn't European law? Just practice for some big companies that want to avoid cryonism?
It is law, just not in every European country, but it's definitely not unusual.
And yes, companies often go with the lowest common denominator across Europe to avoid any doubt when dealing with multinational people. In my personal case it could be reasonably claimed that laws of 5 different countries apply to me based on citizenship, registered residence, actual places of work... Of course my employer wants to be covered.
Re: Ghost jobs are wreaking havoc on tech workers
#243Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is another personal anecdote, but I had an interview earlier this year for a database related role. The job ad had a huge salary range and the interview had nothing to do with the role. I wasn't asked any behavioral or technical questions. The two people on the call just wanted to get to know me. We probably spent several minutes talking about sports. A few days later I got rejected. What the hell?
You're supporting the wrong team? I've also been hired after similar "non-interviews". Sometimes it's hard to know if it's just disorganisation/incompetence or if there's outright fakery going on.
or that they're already confident in technical ability and looking for a culture fit.
Re: Ghost jobs are wreaking havoc on tech workers
#244Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've done tech interviewing for years. Job listing that are to various degree fake are quite common. Of course, fakeness comes in many flavor, from listings posted just to "see if there's anyone out there" (I had a boss who did this regularly) to jobs a supervisor really does want to fill but which they know they won't because the bureaucracy has forced impossible requirements on them. An example: "Junior programmer,…
What is the benefit of knowing "that anybody is out there"? Subjective devaluation of current employees?
devaluation, but also just knowing if we could replace people.
I have 5 Sr. Devs and if any of them split, how long would it take me to replace them? and at what rate? and what skillsets will they have and not have?
Re: Ghost jobs are wreaking havoc on tech workers
#245Earlier quoted context omitted.
The model that Americans would take any job if the wages were high enough is simple but obviously false. For manual labor there's no amount of money you could pay Americans to be farmworkers. For desk jobs there's no amount that'll overcome Americans' cultural belief that you can't do math unless you were born as a special sort of person who is "good at math".
> For manual labor there's no amount of money you could pay Americans to be farmworkers. If you don't think Americans are willing to pick fruits and vegetables, go find a farmer, have him put a sign at the edge of his property that says "Free fruits and vegetables, you pick them yourself" and watch how quickly the field is emptied.
cuz they get to keep the fruit.
no one legal is taking this as a job to pay off a mortgage or a car loan.
Re: Ghost jobs are wreaking havoc on tech workers
#246Earlier quoted context omitted.
The model that Americans would take any job if the wages were high enough is simple but obviously false. For manual labor there's no amount of money you could pay Americans to be farmworkers. For desk jobs there's no amount that'll overcome Americans' cultural belief that you can't do math unless you were born as a special sort of person who is "good at math".
> For manual labor there's no amount of money you could pay Americans to be farmworkers. Ever worked a blast furnace? Or a coal mine? You absolutely can pay enough money to get Americans to do really shitty manual labor.
that may be manual labor but it requires skills, and comes with real risks.
and mines have a lot, like a LOT, of labor laws behind them. you know, the whole sending 10 year olds down the shaft thing and then literally covering up what went wrong.
Re: Ghost jobs are wreaking havoc on tech workers
#247Earlier quoted context omitted.
> For manual labor there's no amount of money you could pay Americans to be farmworkers. If you don't think Americans are willing to pick fruits and vegetables, go find a farmer, have him put a sign at the edge of his property that says "Free fruits and vegetables, you pick them yourself" and watch how quickly the field is emptied.
This is obnoxious pedantry which is ignoring the parent's obvious actual point: food obeys a demand curve just like every other product, and what the parent clearly meant was that, at the labor price native Americans would want for these jobs, the resulting food price would be such that not enough people would buy the food to make it worthwhile. And while this may have been idle speculation a few years ago, we now ha…
The country had a collective temper tantrum. They didn't stop buying food, though...
Re: Ghost jobs are wreaking havoc on tech workers
#248Posting fake jobs should be illegal.
arguably, since its often used to signal financial health for startups and publicly traded companies, it would be considered fraud by the FTC
Re: Ghost jobs are wreaking havoc on tech workers
#249Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's against the rules to call out hiring companies in the thread, primarily because we don't want off-topic arguments and because it would be too easy to exploit it for shenanigans. But since people have been increasingly saying that this is a problem, let's do something about it. My current thought is to add a new instruction at the top asking companies to please only post in the thread if they're committed to resp…
Great idea. Do you also want to address some more root problems of job postings: * done for optics, to look like growth or doing well, or just to have their name out there. * to fill the pipeline for future needs * to assess the hiring market, for planning * (for reasons mentioned in article) to light fire under current employees, or see how replaceable they are * only for a serendipitous unicorn hire, not commodity…
> I'd say job posts have to be truthful, and it's by default implied that they actually good faith intend to fill the position as described, in a timely manner, and that interviews will only be conducted in good faith. If the default isn't true, they should disclose that.
Very few people would disagree with that premise.
The thing is that bad faith actors doing bad faith things are not going to abide by the rules on their own accord, on account of being bad faith actors. So you need enforcement, and I don't really see how HN can enforce any of the things you posted. They're not really in a position to vet anything more than you or I can.
Maybe the initial "who is hiring" post should be more explicit about the lack of moderation and vetting instead.
Re: Ghost jobs are wreaking havoc on tech workers
#250Earlier quoted context omitted.
Great idea. Do you also want to address some more root problems of job postings: * done for optics, to look like growth or doing well, or just to have their name out there. * to fill the pipeline for future needs * to assess the hiring market, for planning * (for reasons mentioned in article) to light fire under current employees, or see how replaceable they are * only for a serendipitous unicorn hire, not commodity…
> I'd say job posts have to be truthful, and it's by default implied that they actually good faith intend to fill the position as described, in a timely manner, and that interviews will only be conducted in good faith. If the default isn't true, they should disclose that. Very few people would disagree with that premise. The thing is that bad faith actors doing bad faith things are not going to abide by the rules on…
There's definitely a chunk of bad-faith people, who'll lie, cheat, and steal, but I think it's the minority.
There's a lot of questionable things that decent people do, in good faith, because they consider it normal and OK. If you tell people "actually, the convention here on that is something different", then I think most will respect that.
One way this doesn't work is if there's a lack of trust. For example, if an employer claims it values X, but actually behaves like Y, employees are less likely to do X, and also less likely to trust or respect the company on anything else.
Another way the HN example doesn't work as well is if the person has strong motivation otherwise. For example, if their boss told them to post a fake job on HN, and they really don't want to come back and say they can't because they just saw a new rule. But a lot of other times, the person doing the posting has more autonomy, or a more decent work environment.
A lot of guessing here, but I think stating a convention would help significantly.