College Graduates Are Finally Catching a Break in This Job Market

Several new signals suggest employers are boosting entry-level hiring this spring after gloomier projections just months ago

By Ray A. Smith and Te-Ping Chen of the WSJ. 

This might be a bit surprising. See the first posts listed below under "Related posts." One is from last Dec. and the other is from last June and they both had grim news for young job seekers. 

Excerpts from the WSJ article:

"A widely watched survey . . . out Monday shows employers expect to boost new-graduate hires by 5.6% this spring from a year ago"

"nearly a third of employers planned to hire a greater share of entry-level workers this year than the previous one."

"unemployment among 20- to 24-year-olds with bachelor’s degrees and higher dropped sharply in March to 5.3%"

"That is down from a decade high, excluding the pandemic’s early months, of 8.9% last fall."

"In some cases, artificial intelligence is spurring hires by enabling companies to expand services and product lines"

"[the % of graduates] "who said they landed a role within three months of graduation climbed to 77% from 63% last year" 

Other related posts:

Companies Predict 2026 Will Be the Worst College Grad Job Market in Five Years: Hires from the Class of 2026 will stay largely flat, employers project, as layoffs rise and AI is able to do more entry-level tasks (Dec. 2025) 

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’ (June 2025) 

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)