Every time you hear someone talk about the “job market,” odds are it comes with a side dish of doom, served hot from Silicon Valley. It’s either: “The robots are taking over!” or “Everyone’s getting laid off at Google!” or my personal favorite, “The only way to land a job now is to hack the ATS with an AI-generated resume optimized for a keyword salad.” The problem? That’s not the job market. That’s just… America. More specifically, it’s just a niche sliver of it.

Let’s talk real: "Globally", the so-called job market is not one big, unified, futuristic, all-seeing, algorithmic beast. It’s a fragmented, messy, human-driven system full of contradictions, quirks, and local flavors. And that’s actually good news.

The FAANG Mirage

The FAANG (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google) obsession is a curious thing. These companies employ a fraction of a fraction of the global workforce, yet dominate job discussions like they’re the only employers on Earth. Most tech content is written from the perspective of a twenty-something software engineer living in San Francisco who thinks a job that pays less than $250K and doesn’t come with stock options and free kombucha is a tragic failure.

While the job search may feel soul-crushing in some corners of the U.S., the picture is vastly different in the rest of the world. In Asia, Africa, South America, and even large swaths of Europe, the job market runs on different fuel entirely.

Beyond the Algorithm

In many countries, job applications aren’t filtered by Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS). They’re filtered by… people. Sometimes, even printed resumes still make the rounds. In some regions, you’ll find job ads on WhatsApp groups or community bulletin boards. Networking isn’t just a buzzword on LinkedIn; it’s literally how jobs get filled. A cousin calls an uncle who knows a guy and.. boom, you're working.

Sure, some big companies in these regions use technology, but the majority of hiring is still local, personal, and surprisingly human. The AI-enhanced, keyword-loaded, ChatGPT-resume-tweaking madness that dominates Twitter (or X, if you prefer your branding confusing) simply doesn’t apply everywhere. In fact, pretending it does just makes people outside of that bubble feel unnecessarily doomed.

Legacy Lives

While tech startups are collapsing in dramatic fashion in one part of the world, legacy companies are quietly thriving in another. Manufacturing businesses in Malaysia, logistics firms in Nigeria, textile companies in Colombia — all hiring, all growing, and all very much not covered by Forbes or TechCrunch.

These aren’t companies doing flashy product launches at developer conferences. They’re the ones keeping supply chains alive, producing real goods, delivering real services. And their hiring isn’t governed by some soulless AI recruiter that auto-rejects you because you missed a keyword.

A lot of people work in boring-sounding companies that make tires, sell rice, maintain elevators, or process insurance claims. Not glamorous. But solid. And hiring.

The Harmful Hype

The narrative that the job market is universally broken is not just wrong, it’s harmful. It convinces fresh graduates in Kenya, Brazil, or Vietnam that if they’re not getting calls from Meta, they’re failing. It tells jobseekers in Serbia that their manually written, well-researched application won’t stand a chance because they didn’t “game the system.”

The truth? Most of the world still operates outside the system. The system is just a guy named Tony in HR who calls you because your aunt recommended you.

Yes, It’s Tough, But Not Impossible

Now, let’s be real. It is harder now than before. The pandemic, inflation, political instability, AI mania, they’ve made hiring slower and risk-averse in many places. But hard doesn’t mean hopeless. And it definitely doesn’t mean that the only jobs worth having are in five companies on the U.S. West Coast.

It’s time we diversified our job market conversations. Include stories from Lagos, Jakarta, Medellín, and Belgrade. Talk to people who found work at family-run businesses or regional champions you’ve never heard of but who’ve been running for 80 years. Highlight the other 90% of the global economy.

So, what is the job market, really?

It’s not a monolith. It’s not an AI-enhanced gladiator pit. It’s not just FAANG and layoffs and LinkedIn outrage posts.

It’s a billion moving parts. It’s local economies, cultural habits, family connections, handwritten resumes, informal interviews, and jobs that exist without ever being posted online. It's imperfect, unpredictable, and frustrating at times, BUT it’s also full of unexpected openings, if you know where to look and stop chasing ghosts.

If you're feeling discouraged by the noise, just remember: the job market isn’t dying, It’s everywhere else. And it’s alive, and will not stop growing anytime soon.


cover image by huleeb