I'm a tech recruiter in Chicago. Due to a lot of the reasons you listed my advice for developers is to reach out to senior developer/leads/architects/managers/c

I'm a tech recruiter in Chicago. Due to a lot of the reasons you listed my advice for developers is to reach out to senior developer/leads/architects/managers/cto's at companies they are interested in working for. I work with 85% of the bigger name tech companies in Chicago and they don't always have their roles posted online. Most of then have urgent roles with no roles posted online because they rarely get any good resumes from it and instead rely on recruiters. Cold email/linkedin message someone at the company you may be interested in working for and I bet they would at least get back to you. At least you wont have to fill out a job application.