44% of US Employers Have Open Roles They Can't Fill — the Most Since 2023
The News
A new Express Employment Professionals-Harris Poll survey finds 44% of US hiring managers say their company currently has open positions it cannot fill — up from 36% in autumn 2025 and the highest since autumn 2023. At the same time, 43% say time-to-hire has grown, 26% say it now takes at least four weeks, and one in five open positions (21%) closes without a hire. Job seekers report their own friction: 31% say automated hiring systems make it harder to feel heard, and an equal share believe employers are advertising roles only to collect CVs. The survey polled 1,006 US hiring decision-makers and 1,000 active job seekers in May and June 2026.Why It Matters
This is a candidate-experience warning dressed as a labour-market statistic. Unfilled roles are climbing while time-to-hire stretches and more requisitions close empty — meaning the bottleneck isn't demand, it's the process between 'role open' and 'offer accepted'. For a TA leader reporting to a CEO, 44% is a concrete number to open a conversation about where the funnel actually leaks: automated screening that filters out qualified people, or interview loops that take a month to conclude.Taking Action
All action is situated in your corporate context. These are starting points, not prescriptions — choose what fits.
Connect
Who to talk with in your enterprise
Your head of talent operations and your recruiting coordinator lead: ask for last quarter's figures on requisitions closed without a hire and median time-to-hire by department, and benchmark them against this survey. Then loop in your employer-brand lead — 31% of candidates suspect you're ghost-posting, and that perception costs you applicants before you've screened a single one.Inspect
What to take a closer look at
Pull your ATS data on two things: the share of requisitions cancelled or closed unfilled in the last 90 days, and the distribution of time-to-hire by stage (screening, interview, offer). Compare your median against the survey's four-week marker and identify the single stage where candidates stall most. Also check that automated rejection notices are actually going out rather than leaving applicants in limbo.Reflect
What to think about more deeply
If one in five of your open roles closes without a hire, is the problem a shortage of talent — or a process designed to say 'no' rather than to make a hire?