Fake job listings are spreading fast, and lawmakers are stepping in — bad news for job hunters and for investors who read hiring numbers as a sign of growth.

• As many as one in five job ads are for roles the company never plans to fill, and the listings can stay up for months.
• New York and Pennsylvania are pushing bills that would force employers to post hiring timelines and pull ads once a job is filled; Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has opened an investigation into LinkedIn over profiting from fake postings.
• Open job counts are a common signal analysts use to judge whether a company is growing, so padded listings can prop up a stock — meaning shareholders, not just applicants, are being misled.
• Companies also use fake postings internally to calm overworked staff after layoffs, promising help that never arrives.
• The wider job market looks weaker than the headline 4.1% unemployment rate suggests: counting people stuck in part-time work or earning poverty-level pay, the "functionally unemployed" share hit about 25% in July and has risen four months running.

Outlook: Expect more state-level rules on job ads and more pressure on LinkedIn, while hiring stays tough for anyone outside the AI-driven parts of the economy.