Having worked with recruiters on the other side, I think the biggest contributor is a version of number 2 - they think they will get a better result via their amazing powers of verbal persuasion and charm.

In reality they are probably applying selection bias and only moving forward on the people sufficiently interested that they actually pick up the phone.

That sounds effective, they are probably happy with that bias. If people aren't interested enough to talk to them for half an hour then the outcome will probably be so-so.

I really disagree, it selects people with high tolerance for others wasting their time, so it chases away the most high value candidates.

Even if the selection part is true, it chases away people who cannot be bothered to interact with a human being for 20 minutes or so. High value is a different set of people with unknown intersection.

No, it is not people who can't interact with a human being for 20 minutes, but with tens of them. If it were an agent / talent model, where it is a somewhat large amount of interaction with a single individual, that would be one thing. But interactively sharing the same information with 20 different recruiters is just a waste of time that has nothing to do with an inability to be bothered to interact with people.

When I get 10 LinkedIn messages a day, no, I cannot be bothered to interact with each of them for 20 minutes. And since they all refuse to send along any relevant details whatsoever, I can't even cull that to the subset that's plausibly interesting.

> via their amazing powers of verbal persuasion and charm.

Not really. Just the mere act of talking to a human being is a more invested act than an email.

I'll add that sales is about overcoming objections. This is done most effectively in real-time. Sales of all variants have a preference for real-time discussions because they can get people to agree with things and navigate the turning no into yes.

The reason they like real time is that they can offer the bare minimum, and then if I don't like it they can then ramp up the offer.

If it's done via email it's basically a silent auction.

So your first offer HAS to be good, because you don't know what the other bidders are bidding.

Right, this makes sense for the person doing the selling. And it's why it makes sense to have a strong bias against people treating one's career as a sales engagement.

I don't think that is true anymore now that several jurisdictions says that the recruiter must mention a number first on the salary. They would never do that if they can at all avoid doing so. At any cost.

Which jurisdictions?

Seems like a weird rule, since the compensation is often subject to negotiation.

Pedantically, That's a range and not a single number. There's a big difference, depending on the size of that range!