Yes. I remember first seeing this in the early 1980s. If you had an opening but you already knew who you wanted to hire, you still had to post the opening; as a formality of corporate policy. Oftentimes those job postings have great detail in the job description and must have expertise on day one (custom tailored to the person they already have in mind) minimizing the number of competing applications.
That's still a common problem, I've ran into a few of those myself. The ones that just don't exist period are harder to weed out - those seem to be just normal posts that never get a reply.
(post is archived)