I'm in the same boat, for all we know the hiring is the same rate but it's through more informal channels like internal recommendations, networking, etc.
A 40% decline in real tech-hiring rates would be a shocking, sudden decline. The simpler, most consistent, and most likely explanation is that the author's data isn't representative of the big picture.
It's very similar to "my helloworld.c won't compile, the compiler must be broken"
Edit: if the author has only been in the business a couple of years, he may not be aware of the historical boom/bust nature of it - yet.
However, as @felipellrocha mentioned, the conclusion that hiring is simply down seems to make the fewest assumptions.