The job market is pretty much like the used car market. There's asymmetrical information. The seller knows all about the product, the buyer knows nothing. What

The job market is pretty much like the used car market. There's asymmetrical information. The seller knows all about the product, the buyer knows nothing. What happens in these markets is that the buyer is willing to give about average price, since he knows nothing about the product quality. This way, high quality products are pulled from the market, pushing the average quality down even more, and so on. To say this in a simpler way, if you are better than average, it's not worth applying for a job, because you'll get a lower price than what you're worth.