One thing I don't see much research into (maybe I'm wrong) is whether the US has major data quality issues with labor data.

Jobs reports just don't seem at all to square away with the vast anecdotal accounts from both employed and unemployed individuals across a swath of industries.

It's no secret that companies put up job listings they either have no intention of filling or are simply H1B fraud (impossible listings used to justify an eventual H1B hire).

This would make the "true" number of open jobs within a sector far, far worse than reported.

Comparing jobseekers to job openings is also a very imprecise approach. For certain industries, the gap is bound to be far worse than for others. And the same is true when you look at it by level, experience, etc.

The US is thus in a weird position where equity markets look OK... largely boosted by gains in a small selection of companies (in what's perhaps an AI fueled bubble) and the economy looks a tad rough but not horrible. The real impact of tariffs + broader economic policy is being underrepresented in the data.

This can only last so long. Eventually, inventories will be depleted and tariff impacts will rear their head. Eventually, the true unemployment rate will result in increased eviction rates, lower savings rates, and lower median consumption.

I think publicly traded companies post employee headcounts in their public financial disclosures, so I would assume we would see a general rise in head counts starting in 2020, followed by a leveling off or decline starting in 2023. For example, Google. https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/GOOG/alphabet/numb...

> Jobs reports just don't seem at all to square away with the vast anecdotal accounts from both employed and unemployed individuals across a swath of industries.

Agreed and on multiple fronts.

e.g. I can imagine that white collar workers may not claim unemployment due to a combination of embarrassment/"I don't need it as much as other folks" so the numbers are probably under-reported there.

I've also heard it's bad for recent grads but then a recent grad I know sent me the below:

"I’ve been hearing this a lot lately, and honestly, it’s pretty silly. Yes, tech majors are definitely over saturated, but in my opinion, you shouldn’t be able to go to school for four years, do the bare minimum the entire time, and get a great job after college. From my experience, everyone who worked really really hard and knew their stuff got to a place that they’re happy with"

The above could have been what I said back in 2002 right after the dotcom boom. In other words, it's unclear if companies are hiring fewer junior folks, junior folks were benefiting from ZIRP/boom market or a combination of both.

I think the reasoning behind why you can mostly look past the fake listings is that the numbers are treated as meaningful relative to each other, and so, the ratio of false listings should be relatively similar.

Instead of fresh college grads, companies are hiring h1bs.