Its simpler then that - everyone is facing a hiring crunch because everyone is preparing to weather massive economic downturn as foreign investment pulls out of United States.
It's a employer's market now and new grads in a number of disciples are increasingly underprepared aside from a handful of target programs.
Furthermore, most companies can limit hiring to at most 15 target programs nationally and maybe 3-4 local programs and get by.
For example, a program like UIUC graduates around 1200 CS and CE majors a year from a program with a 4-6% acceptance rate. Just limiting hiring only to UIUC undergrads who pass hiring standards would be enough to fill an entire new grad class. Same with UMich (~1.5k CS/CE undergrads a year), Cal (~1k CS/EECS undergrads a year), and a handful of other target programs.
And if we feel those candidates are overpriced, we can arbitrage talent globally if needed.
I've mentioned this multiple times on HN as well.
Furthermore, the Econ hiring crisis has been going on for a decade.
The stock market (which determines overall hiring) is propped up by large cap Tech, which is currently riding on AI, which is currently riding on TSMC.
US politically is going down the drain. Its a fuse that can only be extinguished by Trumps health issues. China knows this, and is already doing preparations to invade Taiwan should US significantly weaken.
Every other metric that you are see is secondary to this. Big tech hired like crazy during pandemic to grow for cheap cost, and then fired a whole bunch of people later. Companies dgaf about standards, they can essentially brute force stuff with enough headcount and higher salaries.
And now, everyone is watching and waiting to see what will happen.
Political instability is annoying, but most funds are well diversified beyond mega-cap tech and our LPs don't have anywhere else to park capital. There is some opportunistic geopolitical hedging, but it isn't enough to tip the scales.
For example, in my specific segment of the industry (cybersecurity/DefenseTech), we continued to operate as normal in Israel despite having missiles rain down from across the Middle East, a couple attempted suicide bombings near our TLV office, and employees of our portfolio companies and in some cases our founders being deployed.
> Companies dgaf about standards, they can essentially brute force stuff with enough headcount and higher salaries
We did back when I was in BigTech before I entered PE/VC a couple years ago, and it still matters at the companies that I'm a board member or advisor for.
> And now, everyone is watching and waiting to see what will happen
Partially. A lot of diversification was already done.
> US politically is going down the drain. Its a fuse that can only be extinguished by Trumps health issues. China knows this, and is already doing preparations to invade Taiwan should US significantly weaken
In that hypothetical, where else do we go? In such a world, the EU+UK is likely to see a military confrontation with Russia in the 2028-30 timeframe, China is out of the picture, Japan/SK/Aus would be dragged into conflict, India is likely to see a military confrontation with Pakistan or China by 2035, and the Gulf would re-ignite.
There are events that can happen that are Black Swan events - i.e the unknown, unknowns from an economic perspective, that essentially can fuck up the economy big time. Say Trump institutes martial law after declaring himself forever president. You are going to see significant economic downturn. What happens in a sinking market? Companies move money. Companies will surive. People won't. Its a tale as old as time.
> we continued to operate as normal in Israel despite having missiles rain down from across the Middle East
Thats because an attack by a militant group is much, much different than a economic grind into decline. Its akin to a natural disaster - it doesn't erase economic demand.
>In that hypothetical, where else do we go?
Pretty much WW3. All the ingredients are there, straight down to the ideology being more important than truth. Like you said, when dominoes fall, countries that want to make moves will make moves.
For example, today, Jerome Powell just got indited. Its pretty clear that end of central bank independence is coming. Remember, higher up execs dgaf if US economy fails, they have their money bags. Once 2026 elections get cancelled and US goes full fascist, you are gonna see the shitstorm happen real time. On top of that, if US is in Tumroil, China will most likely invade Taiwan, since NATO wouldn't be able to respond, and bye bye all the stock market gains.
Save this comment if you think im being extremely hyperbolic, and make sure to read it again in 2 years.
If you chose to remain optimistic, thats your decision.
Where to Go as the US Exceptionalism Trade Ends - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2025-06-06/where-... | https://archive.today/PSw9B - June 6th, 2025
Remaking the World Through Exiting US Stocks - https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2025-03-19/remaki... | https://archive.today/YqD5M - March 19th, 2025
Did capital outflows from the U.S. already start? - https://globalecon.substack.com/p/did-capital-outflows-from-... - March 17th, 2025
As such, we have nowhere else to park other than the US, though there is an opportunity for opportunistic hedging.
Furthermore, the articles you yourself provided are either marketing collateral for emerging markets stock (JPM) or opinion pieces by asset managers trying to vouch for their case.
[0] - https://www.reuters.com/business/us-equity-funds-see-weekly-...
There are opportunities that are relatively undervalued (eg. European defense majors), but there just aren't enough to make up for the entire US's public equity market. And don't get me started on exit opportunities for privately held assets (eg. PE/VC).