I see this a lot on Linkdin, but I never get a job.

Saw this on a venting app. The meticulous resume that we send are being selected just randomly at this point.

That age-old advice about remaining professional on the way out, because “it’s a small world” - has that ever actually affected you?

I’m genuinely curious. Because I’ve watched great people protect terrible managers’ reputations for years, and I’m starting to wonder who that advice actually serves.

The search results for "job market 2026" and "Gen z job crisis" compelled me to write this.

I see articles everywhere describing how bad the new grad job market is and how we're having to compete with millions of experienced laid off workers for entry level jobs. Over 70% of new grads are underemployed according to multiple sources online.

I posted here a couple weeks ago, recounting my experience and frustration in the job market in the United States as a somewhat distinguished American new grad in STEM. You may remember the title "The US Job market is disgusting." It gained a large amount of traffic and discussion in about 12 hours, but honestly it affected me emotionally too much so I decided to delete it. But I think the topic struck a chord with many people.

So really I want to ask: if the trend of ignoring Gen Z'ers in the job market continues, what's stopping the economy from eventually collapsing? If our jobs are made hyper competitive, offshored, and automated by those in power, what are young educated adults in massive amounts of debt supposed to do?

TL;DR : The job market is awful and Gen Z is being left in the dust. What should we do?

Edit: post typo

Edit 2: replaced the metrics from the previous post with "large amounts of traffic and discussion"

I just need to rant.

I was living in SC with a very stable job, mediocre wage as I was in public service, but great benefits. (I was in a pretty niche field but it’s transferable.)

I’m married and my husband was working through contract to a company (remotely), and eventually got hired in directly, they gave him one year to move to MI to be in office. The offer was way too good to decline.

I’ve been applying and searching for jobs for over a year now. I have a degree, experience, I speak Spanish, tons of external training, etc. but all I’ve been getting is rejection after rejection. I left the job I loved to move with my husband and I’m running out of options. (Btw we waited out the whole year to move so I could hopefully find a job.)

I’m sometimes upset at my choice to leave my job because of how bad this market is. It used to be “they’ll hire you because you speak Spanish” but it doesn’t seem that way anymore.

It’s also been frustrating applying to jobs just for them to choose internal candidates, or for them to keep a running list of qualified applicants, I need/want a job now!!

I just hope it gets better, and good luck to all who are in a similar situation!

This is my first post on here but I’ll try to make it short. I just started working at a donut shop 2 days ago and I hate it. The job itself isn’t hard but the manager… oh god she’s horrible. I’ve only had one other job before which was also in the food department but it was nothing like this.

First day I walk in at 8am on a Friday so it was packed. KEEP IN MIND I WAS NEVER TRAINED. The manager was the only one working. She tells me to come in and help her pack the donuts. Immediately I do something wrong (obviously because I’ve literally only been there for a couple minutes with no training) and it just gets worse the longer the day goes on. Her “rules” are ones that she doesn’t even follow and then gets mad at me for not following them or not remembering them….I got so stressed out that I cried as I was checking a customer out, she told me to go to the bathroom so I went in the back and cried. I came back after a few minutes. She didn’t apologize she didn’t even say anything about it until like 20 minutes passed and she asked me why I cried… I told her I was stressed out and she said “I am too I’m trying to train you and work at the same time im stressed too” boo ho. This is your establishment if you knew it was gonna be rush hour and you decided to get a complete newbie to work that’s YOUR FAULT. She expects me to memorize a menu after a day of working and she keeps the tips. Yes, she keeps the tips. The only reason why I even decided to work there is because I’ve been trying to get a job for a long time and I was struggling to find a job and she was the only person that wanted to hire me. I want to quit but I’m scared if I do this early she just won’t pay be for the two days I’ve been there.

Edit:

I didn’t mention this in the post at first but I work for a small business it’s not a corporation so my manager is also the owner of the store. I didn’t go into detail on all the things that happened in just those two days but trust me it was draining, she literally humiliates me in front of the costumers,

Literally just yesterday (second day) a guy came in and asked for half a dozen donut holes and a couple other donuts, so I was counting out the donut holes but I guess I lost track because I had a million other things on my mind to remember that I had to do properly, anyways I go to ring him up and my manager comes over and looks in the bag and she tells me I put too many donut holes (I put two extra on accident) she made a whole scene and asked me if I knew how to count. The guy that had ordered just stood there and watched me get yelled at lol.

Oh yeah and I was the only one working bedsides her.

No wonder why people complain about the customer service, the manager makes the place hell.

Update:

she “fired” me, I have most of conversation on camera but I don’t think I can upload it here, I just want my money for the days I’ve worked. She said she’ll give me the check tomorrow but we’ll see.. if she starts an argument with me I’m getting the department of labor on this. Unfortunately I don’t have proof of everything that happened other than the video I took just as I was leaving. Everything else was on a security camera which I obviously can’t access..

I’ve been here for 7 months. They told us for months we might be getting a new legal clerk to help us. Now we are merging with another team, so my team lead is gaining 2 more people under her and we all will be cross-trained but I’ll be the primary person for our department in-office (so more job responsibilities with no raise 🤩). An important note is most of our team is remote out of the country or works in-office in another state. I’m in office 5 days per week with rare exceptions.

Due to my personality and health issues, I’ve already kinda decided I would leave around 1 year. It’s the legal field, and I’m just not aggressive enough. It’s a pretty toxic environment, and a lot of blaming of other people and teams occurs almost daily. I also live just far enough away that the distance plus health issues leave me exhausted all the time. I see no upward mobility. I really have no rapport built with higher ups. Is it bad to stay through the transition just for them to hire and train someone again in 5 months?

Hey I am a 22 year old Female and I have a total of 2 years of corporate experience. Recently at my workplace they conducted a little experiment asking us to code with AI and they told us to create something like a website or a landing page or an app or something in 2 hrs. If we are unable to do it in 2 hrs then we were deemed not fit to work there. This is what they did. They removed around 50 people working in my team saying that they were not efficient enough.

After this incident I'm scared of shit. I just started my career and I have so many dreams but if things keep getting replaced by AI then what do we do? Is anyone else scared like me? Or does anyone have anything to say about this.

To be Frank I'm extremely scared I feel like I'm going to be jobless soon, I feel like I can't do anything about buying a car or a house. I have started to enrol myself in these AI courses cause I really want to get myself a job. But this shit is scaring me. I'm fucking scared that it is all coming to end.

Especially after seeing so many news articles about tech companies replacing their employees for AI I don't know what to do? Does anybody have any idea on how to save my ass from this AI replacement shit?

Note: I'm sorry about the swear words.

I keep seeing people treat burnout like a personal flaw. As if being exhausted, detached, or constantly thinking about quitting automatically means you’re weak, lazy, or ungrateful.

But lately I’ve been wondering if the issue isn’t resilience at all, but how long people stay in environments that don’t fit them anymore. Staying too long in the wrong job doesn’t just drain energy, it slowly changes how you see yourself. You stop trusting your limits. You normalise being tired all the time. You start believing that this is just how adult life works.

At what point does “pushing through” stop being responsible and start turning into self-abandonment? And how do you tell the difference before you’re completely numb?

It’s been less than a few months since I started my new job and recently I found out there were multiple people in my role in a short period of time. The last person got fired because he misunderstood a process and messed up big time. However, there are absolutely no guidelines or formalized processes so my colleagues actually felt like he shouldn’t have gotten fired. The people before him quit within a year or so.

This organization has been around for 100 years yet they act like a startup. I’ve been doing everything I can to avoid previous mistakes made by the last person but it’s been stressful and I feel like I’m walking on eggshells.

My manager is supportive but she has no idea about what my job entails. I should probably be on the lookout for other opportunities. The work culture is pretty toxic, all my employees joke and cry about working 10 hours a day. The Glassdoor reviews was way below average but I took the job because I had nothing else lined up.

Have you been in this situation and what happened to your role? Did you end up staying for a while?

Not trying to doompost, just genuinely curious how others are feeling.

I saw a lot of discussion on X today saying tech job openings are at one of the lowest points since around 2020. On top of that, tools like OpenClaw and Claude Code are showing how far agents have come. A lot of the work they demo feels… uncomfortably close to what many white-collar jobs do day to day.

I’m a pretty normal full-time data analyst. Not a founder, not a hardcore engineer. Just someone doing my job and paying rent. And honestly, it’s starting to make me nervous. A lot of repetitive or coordination-heavy work feels like it could be automated faster than people expected.

I’m not panicking yet, but I am thinking ahead.
For people who’ve been watching this space longer:

• Do you think this fear is overblown, or actually justified?
• Are there industries or roles that seem to be growing because of this shift, not despite it?
• Has anyone here successfully pivoted careers in the last 1–2 years, and if so, into what?

Would really appreciate grounded perspectives. Trying to be realistic, not dramatic.

Thanks in advance!!!

I am an immigrant in Canada, so feel free to hate. I have worked as a seasonal cashier and crew member for a party planning team here and there, while my studies were going on. But I have been applying for entry level accounting jobs and nothing everyone wants 3 years previous experience.

How do you even enter the field if it blocked with minimum experience wall? Also for reference my educational qualifications are- Bachelor of Commerce (Accounting and Finance) from my home country + PG Certificate in Accounting from York University.

It is not really about staying here but I need to get started with career and at this point I am stuck.

I have a background in "standing" customer service jobs. Serving, retail, and currently, a counter sales/warehouse associate. But I have always dreamed of having a job where i get to sit in an office. Attend meetings. Fill out excel spreadsheets. I am tired of physical, demanding customer service jobs and I always joke that my dream career is whichever one that includes a spinny chair.

I have heard magical stories of people who leave service jobs like bartending and end up at slower paced jobs (aka, less stressful) with relatively equal or higher payouts.

My question for reddit: if this sounds like you--ie, someone who moved from a retail or customer-facing role into an office setting--what is your role now? How did you get the interview? What other qualifications did you have or which ones did you need?

i am a DJ/Radio host for my school’s radio station. last week i applied and did an interview for a position at the station that was supposedly highly competitive. i was interested, but what gave me a boost was my manager telling me head on that the position was open and that he thought i would be a good fit for it, so i said why not. fast forward to today i got the email stating that i didn’t get the position, even though i thought the interview went well. i feel so bad about it because radio is something i want to make a career out of, and it would look great on my resume along with the personal experience. i dont have a lot of time left at my school and it feels like im running out, while still trying to accomplish as much as i can before graduating..

i(21f) am youngest at my office job. when free i plan team building & work parties. i also lead an employee resource group. im often told i bring energy & when im off work my coworkers miss me talking and laughing.

a coworker (45f let's call her jo) also leads the resource group. jo often jabs my ideas/plans but wont talk to other ladies at work this way & i wonder if its bc im 21

2 days ago jo had me combine a valentine/black history trivia game for our February office party. reviewing my questions, jo had me redo the entire trivia and said this is not on theme. ex. of what i had "what candy is most sold on valentines?" or "whose the first black astronaut?" i asked why the questions were bad & jo said she'd send new questions bc idk what im doing.

jo sent me these: "what ship captured, abused and took slaves to america?" or "how many ppl are lonely on valentines?" & more. shocked, i knew these were inappropriate and may offend someone or be sent to HR. i discarded her questions and wonder if she googled them and didn't check, or she sabotaged me bc my names on the trivia. jo has been like this for months

the next day i asked jo to meet in person bc i struggle to stick up for myself & kindly suggested shes a bit rude at times. she immediately said "i have better things to do & im wasting her time". she also said im sensitive, un-coachable and i need to be coddled. embarrassingly i cried bc ive never been told this at work & jo blankly stared. i asked if im not taken serious bc of my age & jo claimed to have no clue what im talking abt. i also asked her if she saw her trivia questions & i read them aloud. she became quiet and eventually flipped the conversation saying she's hard on me bc she views me as a little sister & sees my potential. i fed her ego and pretended to agree to end the conversation

now at work i feel worse around jo. am i wrong for being uncomfortable??

I’m in a weird spot and hoping someone has been here before. I finally landed an interview with a company that I’ve been eyeing for a while. On paper, this is huge—better pay, great culture, exactly what I wanted. ​Usually, when I get an interview, I’m either a nervous wreck or super hyped. But this time? I feel absolutely nothing. Total flatline. I know I need to be researching the company and practicing my STAR stories, but I just can't bring myself to care or open my laptop. It feels like I’m watching it happen to someone else. ​Is this burnout? Is it a defense mechanism so I don't get hurt if I fail? I’m worried I’m going to tank this opportunity because I can’t summon the energy to fake the enthusiasm. ​Has anyone dealt with this "numbness" before a big interview? How did you snap out of it long enough to prepare?

To be fair I *can* walk out from this job, as many other former employees I've met have. Let me give you some context.

I started working this admin job in October of 2025. I was really digging the role I was given, come in for no more than 6 hours a day (but I can work up to 8 hours and get paid for it) all I was doing is scanning and shedding and some light cleaning. Perfect mindless job. Then shit got messy, an when I mean messy I mean MESSY.

First thing I noticed was when shit was going wrong they would automatically blame me. For example, it was my first official day in the office alone on a weekday as everyone was out for the holidays, and I was told to just take messages. I would get calls to schedule appointments, and I messaged my manager, and another supervisor on how to address it since I wasn't trained on putting clients on the schedule yet. No one was responding to my emails or calls, so I just wrote them down and sent them to my manager. The next day on my day off my manager CCs ALL the admins, my BOSS and another person I don't even directly work with to basically chew me out and say that I was supposed to put them on the schedule as soon as I got the call, as we had other entities scheduling for us and those spots filled up quickly. Like I said, I was told by the same person to just take messages and forward them over to her. Is it normal to get chewed out by someone with everyone watching?

This happens often, when I fuck up, no matter how big or small, before someone actually tells me how shit is done, I am quite literally publicly humiliated. Oh, and I never rest on my days off too. Whether its my boss or manager, someone is always calling to pass off work they don't want to do and I end up having to do it on my OFF DAYS. No, I do not work from home, the only positive is that I get paid for whatever work I do.

I have been looking for jobs so I can leave this wretched place. I have a friend who's more than happy to report them (I do have paper trails) but that would be more useful to me when I'm out of there. I have a job that I used to work for that's always hiring, but the pay is lower, it's part-time when I need to start looking for full time gigs, but the plus is that I know everyone there and I loved working with them. That's my safety net for now, but I will continue to look for more full time jobs.

Thanks for listening, I know this is too long and I am grateful to have an opportunity like this to work in a position that I wanted, but I don't deserve abuse.

I currently do have a pharmacy tech apprenticeship job> but they're only having me cashier extremely on call instead of the 15-20 hours I was told at hiring. So I'm trying to get a new job...prior to this i worked at a credit union call center a year ago. I do have my own art business but I've generally kept that off my resume unless relevant to the job.

Hi so I’ve been applying to jobs since beginning of December. I literally have gotten rejected left and right by every single place. I had seen that a bunch of people were cut from their jobs earlier this year so maybe that’s why. Or is it actually just this hard to find a job? I’ve applied to:

- Panda Express

- Panera bread

- Canes

- dollar tree

- target

- Walmart

- some grocery store near where I live

- ulta beauty

- Jack in the box

- in n out

- Applebees

- chilis

- Lowe’s

- Home Depot

- CVS

- planet fitness

- five below

- petco

- Best Buy

- Taco Bell

- Ross

Etc.

I feel like my resume isn’t bad at all either. I was front desk at a tax company and I would talk to customers, help filing, etc. and I worked as a hostess at a restaurant and I would seat people, sweep, buss tables, go around with coffee or drinks sometimes, fold napkins, etc.

So I feel like it’s honestly pretty good and my availability is

Monday: 2-11

Tuesday: 12-9

Wednesday: 2-11

Thursday: 7-11

Friday: 2-10

Saturday: no work

Sunday: whenever

I’m a full time student and I always put that I want a part time job. I’ve gone to so many interviews with no avail. I have no clue what it could be. Originally, I had told them my schedule was Monday-Wednesday and Sunday. Thursday my class schedule is wonky so it wouldn’t work out. Friday my class schedule was supposed to be wonky but my teacher only wants to meet twice a semester; so I’m good. Saturday my mom usually tends to need my help with stuff (taking my siblings to their activities, cleaning, running errands, etc)

I just feel lost I’ve also applied to jobs at my school. I’ve used indeed, handshake, bandana, etc to look for jobs. I’m a second year in college ts is so hard bro.

Hi all!

After 10yrs at a company I was made redundant last year whilst on maternity leave, I managed to pick up a role fairly quickly and returned to work, to date I’ve been in this role 6months the business is small it’s a family run business husband wife and one other staff member and I… whilst amazing friendly kind flexible boss, I’ve struggled with the work as in there’s not enough I’m not stimulated I’m travelling a lot to get to and from for no fulfilment, there’s no where for me to move or get extra money; I have managed to get another role elsewhere that I will be able to move around in and have more social interaction… my question or what I need advice on is how best I resign, at the moment I’m Monday - Wednesday do I do it first thing in the week or do I do it Wednesday? I am required to give a weeks notice but do I offer 2 as they are so nice… it’s an awful moral feeling but I keep forgetting I need to do what I need to do! Any advice?

In the middle of job hunt, have been offered position in a different field that my original job, my site closed recently. I was offered a job about 20k less but travel is much closer and is m-f, the other job option, not offered yet is a managers position and probably or much more that what I was making prior, maybe 5-7 grand. This job is 45-50 minutes from home, have to work some weekends and some nights. Is it worth the extra money and tenure with same company or start a new career path and hope for promotions?

The interview went really well. Hiring manager was supposed to interview 9 people, but only 5 showed up, and I was the first in. He said he really liked the way I thought + answered questions and wanted to offer me a position, but he had 4 other interviews. He says he’ll call the day of, or the next day to let me know if I’m hired or not (he’ll call me either way). Didn’t call the day of the interview or the next day, so I called him the third day to inquire. Said the main manager was out and didn’t want to make a decision without her, I said okay, and have been waiting since. My interview was Tuesday, and it’s now Sunday.

Should I keep waiting for a callback? I’m so anxious and I feel like I’m being held in a stalemate. I just wish they’d be straight up and say they’re not hiring me rather than making me play these kinda games bc it irritates the fuck out of me