Few Jobs for Young Workers Part of a Long-Term Trend

by Mike Hall, Oct 1, 2009

Algernon Austin, Economic Policy Institute

If you’re under age 25 and looking for a job, you’re going to have a much tougher time than your older brother or sister did in 1999. Then, 60 percent of 16-24-year-olds had a job. Today, just 48 percent do, the lowest rate of young worker employment since World War II.

Young workers are twice as likely to be unemployed as the overall population—18 percent, compared with the overall unemployment rate of 9.7 percent. The jobless rate soars to 27.3 percent for young African American workers and 21.3 percent for Hispanic workers.

(For more on the economic struggles of a broader group of young workers—under age 35, see our AFL-CIO report, “Young Workers a Lost Decade).”

This morning at a House Education and Labor Committee hearing examining job and economic problems of 20-something workers, Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) warned:

It is clear that the drop in employment is not just the result of a sudden shock to the system, but is part of a larger trend. You cannot ignore the fact that 20 percent fewer young workers are participating in the labor market.

The consequences of reduced work opportunities among young Americans mean fewer long-term employment prospects, less earnings and decreased productivity….If these dramatic trends are not reversed, our nation faces the potential of a generation of youth disconnected from the job market.

In addition to the staggering unemployment and underemployment (32 percent), young workers are carrying unprecedented debt burdens—especially education costs. Even if they have a job, those debts are harder to pay down because of low, shrinking or stagnant wages, says Matthew Segal, founder and co-chair of the coalition built by and for young people, 80 Million Strong for Young American Jobs. He told the committee:

Two-thirds of students holding a bachelor’s degree graduate with more than $20,000 in debt, twice as much as a decade ago. Law and medical school graduates have it even worse, with roughly $76,000 and $155,000 of debt respectively. Approximately 23 percent of freshman borrowers drop out of school because of debt.

The average earnings of full-time workers ages 25 to 34 are lower today than they were a generation ago, except among women with college degrees. And young men without a college education are earning 29 percent less than they did in 1975….Nearly 18 percent of 18-24-year-olds are living below the official poverty line.

Providing new education and economic opportunities needs to begin in high school and focus on both college-bound students and students interested in careers that do not require a college education, testified Algernon Austin, director of the Economic Policy Institute’s (EPI’s) program on Race, Ethnicity and the Economy.

We have to begin with high school curricula. Students need better information and guidance about finding good jobs that do not require a college degree and they also need better advice concerning college selection. Our jobs training programs need to be connected to the current and future labor market and ideally connected to real jobs.

Witnesses also proposed expanding or establishing new paid internship and community service programs; increasing access to community colleges and special emphasis on training for the growing sectors in green jobs, health care and national security.

Click here for witnesses’ written testimony and access to video excerpts of the hearing.

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