Optimistic job applicants driven by pay, not WFH, post-pandemic
Research by Assistant Professor Christopher Rauh, indicates job seekers are more hopeful than they should be, and are wrong in believing there’s not much to be gained from spending more time hunting for a job.
Dr Rauh has found that while workers are overly optimistic about the probability of receiving a job offer conditional on any search, they perceive the marginal return to additional search hours as positive but comparably low.
“In other words, they are more hopeful than they should be about successfully gaining their next role each time they hunt for a job.” he says. “Meanwhile, they think there is not that much more to be gained from spending a lot more time hunting for a job, than there probably is.”
In the working paper Perceived Returns to Job Search, Abi Adams-Prassl, Teodora Boneva, Marta Golin, and Christopher Rauh examine workers’ search behavior and their perceptions of the returns to search, in the context of the post-pandemic change to the level and pattern of labor demand.