Young adults straight out of college are aspiring to start their lifelong dream career. They have been to school for many years and are finally ready to get started with their life. Looking everywhere for jobs to jump start their career but nobody is hiring or can’t afford to pay another person in their work field. The labor force today is not necessarily meant for scholars fresh out of college. It is becoming difficult for young adults to start careers. Although the labor market has slightly bounced back since the Great Recession, it is still hard for young people to find jobs in America.
From December 0f 2007 to June of 2009, America witnessed what is now called “The Great Recession.” During the Great Recession, …show more content…
Wething states, “First, it disproportionately affects young people’s job opportunities” (Wething). The low labor market is defined as “the available supply of labor considered with reference to the demand for it” (Dictionary.com). This means that with fewer jobs available, it is harder for people to get jobs, especially for people new to their field of work. It affects young people in a way where it is uneven employment among young and elder people. In 2007 before the Great Recession, when we had a considerably strong labor market the unemployment rate for young people was 10.5 percent while people through the ages of twenty-five through fifty-four had a rate of 3.7 percent. Now that we have a low labor market, young people’s unemployment rate is 13.6 percent while the older people have an unemployment rate of 5.2 percent. Before America started to experience the Great Recession, 83 percent of young adults were working or at least working for a job. In August of 2015, we saw that this rate dropped 2.3 percent and now sit at 80.7% of young adults in the labor force. “It is reasonable to expect some fall in participation when the labor market weakens and jobs get much harder to find” but it has been more than five years now (Burtless). The past few years, it has been easier to find a job but “despite this improvement, we have yet to see …show more content…
Before the Great Recession, things were not too bad, but the started to pummel and during the Great Recession, unemployment got high because there just weren’t enough jobs on the job market. Today and in recent years, the job market is slowly starting to recover. However, not as significant as it should. Now, a bad labor market is affecting young adults more than we think it is. It is important for young people to be aware of things in the economy and government like a bad labor market because it does affect their lives quite a bit. When they get out of college, they need to be aware that it is a weak labor market and it will be difficult to find a job. Without this knowledge people simply get discouraged when unable to find a job or start a career and they become that small percentage of missing workers. It’s very important to know where the young adults stand in the work force and the government needs to make a change so that everybody that wants to work, can have a job and a healthy future not only for us but the United States as