Young job seekers are finding it tougher to find employment, despite a bustling labor market: 'It was brutal'

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Worries are growing that the labor market is beginning to show cracks, particularly for younger aspirants. The monthly rate of workers with little previous work experience getting jobs has plunged, falling to 13% from its previous peak of 20%, according to Goldman Sachs. “Quite honestly, it was pretty brutal,” one job seeker said. “It felt like a lot of work for little response, little reward.” The hiring rate for all workers is at 3.6% of those counted in the labor force, just off the low of the post-Covid era, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Prior to the pandemic, the hiring rate was last below the current level in August 2014. Samantha McCloud, 16, left, Victoria Garcia, 16, Jessel Rincon, 16, at college and career fair at Temple City High School on Saturday, Oct. 21, 2023 in Temple City, CA. Irfan Khan | Los Angeles Times | Getty Images

After receiving a graduate degree, Julianna Larock was bombarded with news about the powerful labor market and how much demand there was for skilled workers.

But that wasn’t her reality.

Instead, she spent untold hours browsing through networking sites such as LinkedIn, attending mixers and other professional events, and generally scouring the collective workplace for something that would fit her desire to land a job in the world of finance. All to no avail.

“Quite honestly, it was pretty brutal,” says Larock, 25, a Wilmington, Delaware, native now living in New York City. “It felt like a lot of work for little response, little reward.”

Fortunately, after slogging through a year of dashed hopes, interspersed with some contract work to get her through, Larock found full-time employment as an executive assistant and research associate for Acumen, a nonprofit impact investment firm in New York. The firm was founded by Jacqueline Novogratz, sister of prominent investor Michael Novogratz, the CEO of crypto-focused Galaxy Investment Partners.

Julianna LaRock Courtesy: Julianna LaRock

While Larock is content with her current station, getting there was rough and the future feels uncertain.

“The depression and the anxiety that was coming from the job search oftentimes bubbled over into a lot of my other social relationships,” the University of Delaware and Fordham graduate says. “People can only be so supportive, and you just felt like

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The full article is available here. This article was published at CNBC Economics.