I think that would necessarily reduce applications from people with less disposable wealth, unless it was a fee so small as to be useless.
If it became a widespread expectation, it will also be gamed by employers (or “employers”) who could advertise positions when they have no intention of accepting any applicants, or firing the successful applicant almost immediately. That seems strictly worse for everyone else.
Even without such expectations, there are some doing this sort of thing right now using any number of whack-a-mole business names. The government here has warnings on their website for job seekers that no legitimate employer should ever ask for any payment prior to employment.
The fee could be to the government (and this is the way I interpreted Shankar’s comment), so a kind of tax on applications. This seems to resolve the issues you mention except for the first one. For that a small monthly subsidy based on some function of income/having a job or not/wealth could be an idea.
Then a similar thing could be done for job openings by companies to avoid fake job listings etc.?
I expect that sort of thing could work in some circumstances. The maxim is “tax what you want to see less of” after all.
The government here currently pays unemployed people a living allowance while they look for work, on the condition that they apply for jobs or similar activities: the default requirement equates to 20 job applications per month[1]. I suppose the government could both require people to apply for jobs on penalty of losing their living allowance if they don’t, and also charge them to apply for jobs, but this seems inefficient.
Why not the more obvious solution of simply charging an application fee?
I think that would necessarily reduce applications from people with less disposable wealth, unless it was a fee so small as to be useless.
If it became a widespread expectation, it will also be gamed by employers (or “employers”) who could advertise positions when they have no intention of accepting any applicants, or firing the successful applicant almost immediately. That seems strictly worse for everyone else.
Even without such expectations, there are some doing this sort of thing right now using any number of whack-a-mole business names. The government here has warnings on their website for job seekers that no legitimate employer should ever ask for any payment prior to employment.
The fee could be to the government (and this is the way I interpreted Shankar’s comment), so a kind of tax on applications. This seems to resolve the issues you mention except for the first one. For that a small monthly subsidy based on some function of income/having a job or not/wealth could be an idea.
Then a similar thing could be done for job openings by companies to avoid fake job listings etc.?
I expect that sort of thing could work in some circumstances. The maxim is “tax what you want to see less of” after all.
The government here currently pays unemployed people a living allowance while they look for work, on the condition that they apply for jobs or similar activities: the default requirement equates to 20 job applications per month[1]. I suppose the government could both require people to apply for jobs on penalty of losing their living allowance if they don’t, and also charge them to apply for jobs, but this seems inefficient.
One could argue that this requirement is far too high and I would agree.