The answer is “Yes, the global job market is haunted.”

Here is the evidence:

Ghosting? – You have a nice chat with a recruitment consultant who assures you that the right opportunity will come along. You occasionally try to get in touch again. You are dead to them. Were they perhaps just a figment of your imagination all along?

Nether World? – You submit a job application and it is swallowed and disappears without acknowledgement, never to be heard from again. Did you even send it? No-one knows. Like a black hole but more mysterious.

Phantom jobs? – There is data on this. Something like half of the jobs advertised will not be filled. They have no intention to fill them. Another big chunk are old adverts – months old, just floating around wasting the time of innocent job seekers. They’re harvesting your data most likely and boosting their contacts/pool/followers. Or they’ve awarded the job to a robot. Probably both.

Demented murder clowns? – There’s actually a nationwide shortage of demented clowns. Please apply for this $10/hr role with 15-stage application process.

Nightmare? – Yes.