This is what the other side of a hiring blitz looks like. On the ascent, company after company speculatively hired extremely expensive workers - because the surface economic signals were misleading people who should have known better. There was so much money to throw at employees that offers were being extended just to keep candidates away from competitors.

This went on so long and with such fury that employees, candidates, and CS students began to view the orgy of overspending as the new normal.

Now a normalization of economic conditions throws the entire thing into reverse. Too many fresh-faced candidates showing up with resume in hand, too many workers on payrolls doing little to nothing for wages 3-10x what they should be, too little revenue to continue business as usual, and a stock market that pulled the rug out from public companies using shares as a form of self-printed currency.