Young Graduates Are Facing an Employment Crisis

Slow hiring is especially daunting for those just starting out; ‘Right now, I’m pretending employment doesn’t exist’

By Justin Lahart and Te-Ping Chen of The WSJ. Excerpts:

"The overall national unemployment rate remains around 4%, but for new college graduates looking for work, it is much higher: 6.6% over the past 12 months ending in May. That is about the highest level in a decade—excluding the pandemic unemployment spike—and up from 6% for the 12-month period a year earlier." (people ages 20 to 24 looking for work who have at least a bachelor’s degree)

"Those ages 35 to 44 with bachelor’s degrees had a 2.2% unemployment rate over the past 12 months, though that was up from 1.8% over the prior period."

"unemployment among college grads ages 22 to 27 averaged 5.8% in the first three months of this year"

"he gap between the unemployment rate for these young graduates and the broader population became its widest in about 35 years"

"The culprit, economists say, is a general slowdown in hiring. That hasn’t really hurt people who already have jobs, because layoffs, too, have remained low"

"Entry-level hiring has fallen by 17% since April 2019"

"hiring has . . . weakened in . . . areas that have traditionally snapped up many college graduates including tech and financial services"

"companies are increasingly leaning on artificial intelligence to perform low-level tasks that a new employee might have done."

"High-school graduates ages 18 to 19 with no college averaged an unemployment rate of 14.5% over the past 12 months. That is up from 13.3% over the prior 12-month period."

Other related posts:

What Happens When a Whole Generation Never Grows Up? As American 30-somethings increasingly bypass the traditional milestones of adulthood, economists are warning that what seemed like a lag may in fact be a permanent state of arrested development (2025) 

The White-Collar Hiring Rut Is Here. That’s Bad News for Young College Grads. (2024)

The Class of 2023 Faces a Jittery Job Market: ‘The World Seems to Have Flipped on Its Head.’ (2023) 

The Class of 2020 Looks for Work (2020)

Historically, college students who graduate into a recession have settled for lower-paying jobs at less prestigious companies (2020)

Has The Recession Been Hard On College Graduates? (2010)

How Recessions Affect Young People (2010)