The same companies that claim to be unable to hire anyone pass by many qualified candidates. You can read stories of people who have applied to 50 or 60 jobs with qualifications suited for those jobs but they only get a couple of responses and one interview.
I know from speaking with some young people in our town that the on-line systems used for hiring by major corporations are flaky at best. I heard from one IT guy that their HR system had so many incoming resumes backed up that they just cleared the queue every Friday night, dumping hundreds of applications unseen by anyone at the company.
Some retailers are requiring multiple interviews, on-line screening, and a lengthy hiring process for entry level retail jobs. The hiring process seems to take longer than the average time an employee stays at the company.
Just looking at what the businesses are actually doing suggests maybe that they are more intent on keeping down staffing levels than they are hiring people.
Ugh....HR
Employing the otherwise unemployable by giving them tasks that hinder employing the useful