<story><title>Tell HN: The ratio of wants-to-be-hired to is-hiring is at a record high 0.94</title><text>Counting the comments in the who wants to be hired thread and dividing by the number of comments in who is hiring = 0.94.&lt;p&gt;A year ago it was 0.23. Here&amp;#x27;s a plot with the data from the past couple of years - https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;pasteboard.co&amp;#x2F;tjZd0PgTI8GK.png&lt;p&gt;(posting this about a day after the April thread opened)</text></story><parent_chain><item><author>mortenjorck</author><text>&lt;i&gt;&amp;gt; It does amuse me that we&amp;#x27;re still at more people hiring than looking for jobs&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;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.&lt;p&gt;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.</text></item><item><author>muzani</author><text>I&amp;#x27;d like to see data go all the way back to 2020, which was when some people said had the worst job market, because of the global lockdowns. But thanks for the data anyway.&lt;p&gt;It does amuse me that we&amp;#x27;re &lt;i&gt;still&lt;/i&gt; at more people hiring than looking for jobs. It&amp;#x27;s a stark contrast to other industries, where the power is normally in the hands of employers.&lt;p&gt;Another thing to consider is that we&amp;#x27;ve had layoffs recently, i.e. people without jobs encouraged to find new jobs. In the past, wants-to-be-hired may be a little low because usually people don&amp;#x27;t want to be seen looking for a job while employed.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>chucksmash</author><text>That&amp;#x27;s basically my outlook, I wouldn&amp;#x27;t post in the WWTBH thread. In addition to the reasons you listed, I&amp;#x27;d also add that while my identity certainly isn&amp;#x27;t hidden and I&amp;#x27;m not out here being controversial, my HN posts are decidedly more of the &amp;quot;my thoughts are my own&amp;quot; variety and not something I&amp;#x27;d link a hiring manager to otherwise.</text></comment>
<story><title>Tell HN: The ratio of wants-to-be-hired to is-hiring is at a record high 0.94</title><text>Counting the comments in the who wants to be hired thread and dividing by the number of comments in who is hiring = 0.94.&lt;p&gt;A year ago it was 0.23. Here&amp;#x27;s a plot with the data from the past couple of years - https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;pasteboard.co&amp;#x2F;tjZd0PgTI8GK.png&lt;p&gt;(posting this about a day after the April thread opened)</text></story><parent_chain><item><author>mortenjorck</author><text>&lt;i&gt;&amp;gt; It does amuse me that we&amp;#x27;re still at more people hiring than looking for jobs&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;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.&lt;p&gt;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.</text></item><item><author>muzani</author><text>I&amp;#x27;d like to see data go all the way back to 2020, which was when some people said had the worst job market, because of the global lockdowns. But thanks for the data anyway.&lt;p&gt;It does amuse me that we&amp;#x27;re &lt;i&gt;still&lt;/i&gt; at more people hiring than looking for jobs. It&amp;#x27;s a stark contrast to other industries, where the power is normally in the hands of employers.&lt;p&gt;Another thing to consider is that we&amp;#x27;ve had layoffs recently, i.e. people without jobs encouraged to find new jobs. In the past, wants-to-be-hired may be a little low because usually people don&amp;#x27;t want to be seen looking for a job while employed.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>onionisafruit</author><text>This is my first month looking. I thought about posting yesterday, but I am very shy about putting my name on the internet. That insecurity won the day. I hope you get good results from your post.</text></comment>