[vsareto]

>I can't imagine that jobs acquired this way ever last, but that doesn't stop people from trying.

Probably because there's a real slice of the job market that gets paid six figures to do nothing much more than browse the internet all day.

2 of the 5 tech jobs I've had have had this. I kid you not, I spent 6 months opening my PC, watching email, and doing whatever I wanted from home. My current job is like this as well but I actually get to help others, so it's not as bad. Believe me, I don't want it -- it gets very boring, very quickly, but legal agreements mean you can't really work on anything else.

And it's not hard to imagine someone trying to cover up a blunder of making a bad hire by giving them no work or busy work because the company is just awash in so much cash that it doesn't actually affect much to just let them leech compared to the reputation damage of admitting that mistake.

Every time someone cannot believe this is possible, I have no empathy for them. It has happened over and over and over and over again. If you don't believe this happens, you are being willfully ignorant! Don't be ignorant!

Sadly there just isn't a good solution for it. A more complex interview doesn't fix it.