Yup. Ths also raises interesting questions.
Stepladders would do well much like they are used for fruit gathering, only as furniture type "building" - staircase without supporting.
But then, why have two versions? Maybe the present use should involve installing them as furniture with flag that automatically slates them for removal once the job is done? This would also be immune to related problems caused by job interruptions
and widen the bottleneck of hauling+collecting:
- All requests for ladders from 1 or more dorfs trying to collect fruit (but can't reach them) generate generic jobs for arbitrary number of furniture-hauling dorfs.
- Likewise, once there's no more jobs to be done using it, slating it for removal allows any idle furniture-hauling dorf to do so,
- If there still is a job to do with this ladder, it will not be hauled back and forth, but used by the next fruit-collecting dorf, until there isn't - and then see above,
- If somehow a bug still wriggles through? Being furniture, it can be removed manually just like any other building, which is at least less inconvenient than a "stuck" ladder.
Hmm, why only stepladders? The same "remove after use" flag could be also useful at least for single-use levers and pressure plates.
Rope ladders... perhaps mostly a great bonus to climb skill?
(BTW how climbing affects pathfinding, anway?)