40 Percent of Companies Reportedly Posted Fake Job Listings in 2024 as States Move to Ban Them

A ResumeBuilder survey published in 2024 found that 40 per cent of hiring managers surveyed said their companies had posted fake job listings that year, as lawmakers in New York and Pennsylvania move to force employers to provide greater transparency about whether vacancies are real.

The term 'ghost job' generally refers to an advert posted on platforms such as LinkedIn or Indeed when an employer has no immediate intention of filling the role. Some listings may reflect cancelled vacancies, frozen budgets or internal candidates rather than deliberate deception.

For applicants, however, the result can look much the same: time spent applying, followed by silence. That frustration is now reaching state governments.

Ghost Job Listings Face New York Rules

New York legislators passed a bill in June requiring certain employers and job platforms to explain their hiring intentions in job advertisements.

The legislation applies to employers with at least 100 employees and third-party job-posting entities.

Under the legislation, employers with at least 100 employees would have to say whether a role is expected to be filled within 90 days, scheduled for a later date or being advertised solely to collect CVs for possible future vacancies.

The bill would also require employers and third-party job platforms to remove a listing within two weeks after the position has been filled.

Violations would carry a $2,500 (£1,850) fine for each publication or digital platform on which the advertisement appears, with the fine doubling for every 30 days the violation remains uncorrected.

The language matters because a conventional job advert implies an active opening. Applicants may reasonably assume a company is looking for someone now, not building a database of potential candidates while presenting the role as available.

Pennsylvania is considering a similar approach. State Rep. Jim Prokopiak introduced House Bill 2321 on 26 March, which would require greater transparency around hiring intentions and other details in job postings.

The measure was referred to the House Labor and Industry Committee and has not passed the Legislature.

'When people are putting the time and effort into applying, there's a reasonable expectation that there is a job out there,' Prokopiak said. Other states have also considered legislation addressing misleading or inactive job advertisements, reflecting growing scrutiny of the practice.

How Common Are Ghost Job Ads?

The 40 per cent figure comes from a ResumeBuilder.com survey commissioned by the careers website and conducted through Pollfish. The survey initially screened 1,641 respondents before 649 qualified hiring managers completed it.

Respondents were required to be over 25, earn at least $75,000 (about £55,500) in household income, hold a manager-level position or higher and work for a company with more than 10 employees. They also had to say they were involved in hiring.

That methodology deserves attention. The finding measures the share of surveyed hiring managers who said their companies had posted fake listings, not the proportion of US companies or all job advertisements that were fake. It should not be read as evidence that 40 per cent of every online vacancy was deliberately fraudulent.

Among respondents, 30 per cent said their company had an active fake listing. The stated reasons included making the organisation appear open to external talent, suggesting that the business was growing, easing concerns about workloads and collecting CVs for future use.

Seven in 10 hiring managers surveyed considered the practice morally acceptable. Respondents who reported using fake listings also attributed benefits such as improved revenue, morale and productivity to the practice.

Those responses reflect their perceptions rather than independently verified measures of company performance.

More recent Greenhouse data offers a different, though related, picture. The hiring platform found that 19 per cent of jobs advertised on its clients' digital job boards during the second quarter of 2026 showed no meaningful hiring activity after applications were received, according to reporting by The Wall Street Journal.

The figure does not prove that every stalled advert was a ghost job. A hiring freeze, a changed budget or an internal recruitment process can interrupt a legitimate search.

Still, for jobseekers, a listing that attracts applications but produces no movement can become a dead end.

Jobseekers Pay the Price

Heather Sanford, a 44-year-old marketing professional, told The Wall Street Journal that she had applied for more than 3,000 jobs since her contract role ended in May 2025.

She regularly checks LinkedIn and other job boards, applying for positions matching her experience or transferable skills. In some cases, she later sees the same advert appear again without receiving a meaningful response.

'If you've posted a job and you have 500 applicants, are you telling me not one or two or three are qualified?' Sanford said. 'Are you looking for a unicorn? Or is it not a real job?'

The issue has also drawn scrutiny of job platforms. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton opened an investigation into LinkedIn in July over allegations that the company may have misled jobseekers through fake or inactive job listings while marketing paid subscription services.

His office issued a Civil Investigative Demand seeking information about LinkedIn's verification, advertising and marketing practices.

LinkedIn has defended its system and said its policies require job listings to be 'authentic and accurately represented'. The investigation is an inquiry into allegations and does not establish that LinkedIn violated the law.

The legislative push is therefore less about banning every delayed recruitment process than requiring greater transparency about whether employers genuinely intend to fill advertised positions.

For applicants spending hours preparing CVs, cover letters and applications, that distinction can determine whether a vacancy represents a genuine opportunity or a job that may never be filled.