[forducks]

Oh how I would love to just stop looking for jobs for a bit and leave it on rest.

Unfortunately I am selling things off right now to not go homeless and refusing to apply to jobs is an admission of defeat to me. Said as a (former?) tech worker.

[SCUSKU]

Read through your comment history and it sounds gnarly. I hope you find something soon. I was unemployed for 6 months in 2022-2023 and it was horrible. I guess I learned something from it, but I hated it. That said, I became employed after applying to a role by emailing the CTO after they posted on the monthly Who's Hiring thread. I've had 2 jobs from HN since.

HN has been huge for my career personally, so I made this site to help make it easier to find stuff that's good for you: https://hnresumetojobs.com/

Sincerely wishing you the best of luck.

[brandall10]

Just for clarification, you've had 3 jobs in the past 2 years? Were some of these contracts?

Otherwise oof, that sounds like volatility only worth dealing with if one really needs an income, esp. considering the signal for prospective employers.

[brailsafe]

> only worth dealing with if one really needs an income, esp. considering the signal for prospective employers.

Is this not the purpose of a job? I've had 3 long-term jobs/contracts since the pandemic, for a total of 2.5/5 years, and that's a better rate of the prior 6 years before that. Idk what their story is, but I think it's pretty typical for people who've had stable careers for one reason or another to assume it's within someone's control how often or how long they're able to work for. Sure, sometimes you're just job hopping or intentionally taking risks on early startups, but if the job goes away—depending on many factors—the ability to turn around and get another one can take a laughable amount of time, and the awareness of the perception of "the signal for prospective employers" compounding that difficulty makes it harder the longer it takes.

I try not to think about it, but there's been numerous times where I've been a year or more out from losing a job due to layoffs or financials or whatever, and getting rejected by even the least desirable place in the 4th+ round of interviews, usually by that point shifting my energy from applying/interviewing to looking at trade school. Imo it's always been brutal out there if you don't know someone running a startup who'll hook it up right away.

In my personal experience, as of the start of my current job and every time prior, in 10 years I'd accumulated no savings, always draining it to nearly zero by the time I'd get the next one. Ain't pretty.

[SCUSKU]

I was laid off in Aug 2022, found a new role in March 2023, then found another role in March 2024. So basically 2 roles in 2.5 years. It's fairly common in the bay area, especially since I'm in the startup space.

[squigz]

> (former?)

This hurts. As someone who's been unemployed, struggling with mental health issues, for far longer than I'd care to admit in such a forum, I struggle with the question of when it's just been too long to realistically get back into it.

I wish you luck

[atemerev]

Was at your place two weeks ago. Was selling things. Found a job finally by a sheer stroke of luck within my network (cold applying never worked for 7 months).

I wish you all the best and hope you find a job too.

[apwell23]

is the job market really that bad for tech workers :( . I got laidoff on paternity leave last week. I am so scared.

Hope you find something soon !!

[leptons]

It's as bad or worse than the 2000 dot-com bubble burst right now. We had a covid bubble for a while and that burst. The AI bubble is next to burst.

[titanomachy]

Sounds awful. You're articulate and it sounds like you have a decent amount of experience, I hope you find some employment commensurate to that.

I've had some extended periods of unemployment. Only advice I can offer is to strengthen existing social connections and put yourself in situations where you can meet new people. I've gotten work before from people I met in random social contexts. I guess you could call this "networking", but I hate that word. It's good to reduce your isolation, whether or not it directly lands you a job.

Email in bio if you want to chat. Maybe I can help.