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The job market is giving haunted house
Ghost jobs, layoffs, odd data, and the smartest moves to make this week.
"If you don’t commit to living life on your terms, other people will commit you to theirs."
-FS👋 Welcome, Jobseekers
This week’s job market is giving “haunted house,” not “career ladder” so we’re calling out the hiring mirage (ghost jobs + fake listings) and how to route around it without donating your sanity to process theater. Then we pivot hard to offense: a tight list of hot companies actually worth your clicks, a layoff reality check, a BLS jobs report so weird it came with its own footnote, and a somatic reset to get your nervous system back on your side before 2026 hits the gas.
🧑✈️ Career CoPilot: The Hiring Mirage: Ghost Jobs Are Wasting Your Time (and Spiking Your Stress)
📡 Company Radar: 🔥 Hot Companies This Week - Databricks, Radiant Nuclear, Port, Runware, Mirelo, On Me
📉 Layoff Report: PowerSchool, Amazon, TikTok, and too many more
📈 Trends & Data: The Jobs Report Was So Weird, the BLS Basically Put a Footnote on Reality
🪷 Mental Health: Shed & Surge: A Somatic Reset for 2026
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🔥 Hot Companies This Week
Either through, funding rounds, mergers, IPOs, or more, we have the top signals for you to make the best jobseeking decisions.
Coursera (edtech, public, merging with Udemy)
Fresh signal: Coursera and Udemy announced a merger agreement valued around $2.5B.
Likely roles: AI product, platform engineering, data science (learning analytics), growth, enterprise integrations.
Databricks (data + AI platform, late stage)
Fresh signal: raised $4B at a $134B valuation to keep pushing deeper into AI products.
Likely roles: data engineering, platform/backend, ML infra, product analytics, PM for AI/data tools.
Radiant Nuclear (climate + energy infra, growth stage)
Fresh signal: raised $300M to build a 1MW reactor, explicitly targeting data centers and signing a deal with Equinix.
Likely roles: hardware, systems, embedded, safety, operations, plus software for monitoring/controls.
Port (developer tools, Series C)
Fresh signal: raised $100M at an $800M valuation to compete with Spotify’s Backstage in the internal developer portal space.
Likely roles: full-stack, platform, DevOps/SRE, product design for developer UX, PM for dev tools.
Runware (genAI infra for devs, Series A)
Fresh signal: raised $50M to make image and video generation easier for developers via API.
Likely roles: infra, API/backend, ML systems, developer relations, product.
Mirelo (genAI audio, early growth)
Fresh signal: raised $41M to solve AI video’s “silent problem” by generating soundtracks.
Likely roles: ML/audio, backend, product, creative tooling design.
On Me (consumer fintech-ish gifting, seed)
Fresh signal: raised $6M for a mobile-first gift card platform.
Likely roles: mobile, payments, growth product, UX.
The Hiring Mirage: Ghost Jobs Are Wasting Your Time (and Spiking Your Stress)
What’s happening
A non-trivial slice of job postings are not tied to an active hire. That mismatch turns job searching into a time sink and a mental health tax.
The data that matters
1) The mental health hit is real
72% of job seekers say the search has negatively affected their mental health.
Biggest drivers: long timelines, poor communication, and repeated dead ends.
2) “Ghost jobs” show up at meaningful rates
Greenhouse (a major hiring platform) has reported roughly 18% to 22% of jobs posted on its platform in a given quarter could be classified as “ghost jobs” (posted without intent to hire).
Even if some are “pipeline building” vs pure deception, the practical effect is the same: your application effort often doesn’t map to a real decision.
3) Openings can overstate real hiring demand
Using BLS JOLTS openings vs hires, analysis has estimated about 28% to 32% of openings in recent months did not convert into hires (example: June 2025 ~7.4M openings vs ~5.2M hires).
Not every gap is a fake listing, but it’s a loud warning: posted demand is not the same thing as hiring demand.
What this means for you (the “so what”)
If you’re feeling burned out, it’s not just “rejection.” It’s often market noise plus process theater.
The goal is to stop donating your best hours to roles that are not real.
The playbook: how to route around ghost jobs
Step 1: Treat “Easy Apply” like a lottery ticket
Use it, but do not build your week around it.
Your core strategy should be roles you can verify are real.
Step 2: Use a “proof before effort” rule
Before you invest deep time (custom cover letter, project, take-home):
Confirm it’s on the company careers page (not only a repost)
Check recency (posted/updated recently)
Look for a named recruiter or hiring manager
Try to validate via:
a warm intro
a quick recruiter message
an employee confirmation
Step 3: Shift to inputs you control
Track and optimize:
Outreach sent
Conversations booked
Referrals requested
Follow-ups completed
Step 4: Protect your nervous system like it’s part of the job
Time-box applications (example: 60 to 90 minutes)
Do a hard stop after your daily quota
Add a decompression ritual after applying (walk, workout, breathwork)
Quick scam-defense note (especially on LinkedIn)
LinkedIn has been expanding verification features aimed at reducing recruiting scams. Still, stay sharp.
Bottom line
Ghost jobs distort your emotional dashboard. Once you assume some postings are mirages, you stop internalizing silence as a personal verdict and start spending your effort where real hires happen.
Source: TrueUp
The Trade Desk Lays Off Staff One Year After Its Last Major Reorg
Rad Power Bikes files for bankruptcy and is looking to sell the business
Amazon European Hub in Luxembourg Braces for Record Job Cuts
Amazon cuts 84 jobs in Washington state, unrelated to broader layoffs
PowerSchool cuts workforce as part of business restructuring
After over $390 million in funding, Believer Meats abruptly shuts down
Outbound Aerospace winds down after exotic aircraft concept reaches the end of its financial runway
Lusha cuts 8% of workforce, citing need to reallocate resources
The Jobs Report Was So Weird, the BLS Basically Put a Footnote on Reality
Overview
The October–November jobs data is a “read with caution” release, but the signal is still clear: hiring is thin, unemployment is higher, and most of the job growth is coming from health care, not the broader economy, according to Indeed Hiring Lab and the BLS Employment Situation release.
The Details
Payrolls: +64,000 jobs in November; -105,000 in October (combined release due to shutdown).
Unemployment: 4.6% in November; October unemployment data won’t be published (household survey not collected).
Pay: Average hourly earnings rose 3.5% YoY in November.
Federal payroll shock: federal employment fell 162,000 in October as deferred resignations hit payrolls.
Job growth concentration: 499,000 net jobs YTD, with 630,000 from private education + health services (implying -131,000 without it).
Data may be revised down: Powell flagged potential ~60,000/month overstatement risk; BLS also announced upcoming changes to the birth-death model starting with January 2026 data.
Nerd Note: The BLS “birth-death model” estimates jobs from new business openings minus closures before full tax-record data arrives. It can miss turning points.
Why It Matters
If you’re a tech jobseeker, this is a “narrow bridge” market: a few sectors are hiring, while many others are flat or shrinking. That usually means slower interview loops, more competition per role, and more pressure to target resilient pockets (health care, certain construction and trades-adjacent work) instead of “spray and pray.”
🪷 Shed & Surge: A Somatic Reset for Your 2026 Rebirth
Don’t forget!
Marian Bacol, founder of somarae, is hosting a Somatic Reset on Thursday, December 18 at 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM PST.
You will leave feeling:
calmer
clearer
lighter
more spacious
more courageous
more connected to your body
more ready to step into your next chapter
If that sounds like something you need, you can register for Marian’s free somatic reset below!
📅 Register here: https://luma.com/a80iyzma
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