Availability badge -What is the point?

[#1]

Okay.

Let's do an experiment.

Go to.

https://www.upwork.com/hire/

Put in your area of expertise.

Now look at how many of these freelancers have an availability badge, yet this is the first step a client can look for freelancers.

I did two tests, one in transcription and one in web development, in both cases the first 27 freelancers presented less than 25% of them did not have an availability badge. 

So who do we bother?

Also, I refreshed the page, several times, the same 4 names appeared at the top every time, although some names below changed.

Don't take my word for it, try it yourself in your area of expertise, let's compare results.

[#2]

In addition, one freelancer in this test had over 200 open contracts and had not earned any money since the initial one-off payment, aren't we told that contracts that don't earn money after a period of time can impact your JSS?

And yes, I know they arent earning because I know the client in question and they always open separate contracts for individual pieces of work.

It seems to me that the rules are made but for some reason they don't seem to be enforced.

[#3]

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Pete L wrote:

 aren't we told that contracts that don't earn money after a period of time can impact your JSS?

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No. This isn't true.

[#4]

As Kim said, it isn't true. I've talked with one of the moderators and they clearly mentioned that contracts with no new milestone for a long period won't impact your JSS at all.

[#5]

You seem to assume that the availability badge places you higher in search results. It doesn't, and upwork never claimed it did.  In fact, they specifically say that the badge benefits people who get a lot of views (already).