Young US college graduates facing employment crisis

Over two years, Ms Rebecca Atkins filed more than 250 job applications, and felt like every application was going into a gaping chasm - one opened by the highest unemployment rate for recent college graduates in the United States in more than a decade.

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WASHINGTON - Over two years, Ms Rebecca Atkins filed more than 250 job applications, and felt like every application was going into a gaping chasm - one opened by the highest unemployment rate for recent college graduates in the United States in more than a decade.

"It was extremely dispiriting," said the 25-year-old, who graduated in 2022 with a degree in law and justice from a university in the US capital Washington. "I was convinced that I was a terrible person, and terrible at working."

At 5.8 per cent, unemployment for young, recent graduates from US universities is higher than it has been since November 2013, excluding 15 months during the Covid-19 pandemic, according to official data.

Moreover, it has also remained stubbornly higher than overall unemployment - an extremely unusual situation, analysts say.

And while overall US unemployment has stabilised between 3.5 per cent and 4 per cent post-pandemic, unemployment for recent college graduates is only trending higher.

The labour market for new grads has weakened consistently since 2022, with new hiring down 16 per cent in 2025, year over year, according to payroll firm Gusto.

Analysts say the trend is likely a result of cyclical post-pandemic hiring slowdowns - particularly in new-grad-heavy sectors such as technology, finance and business information - and overall economic uncertainty in the tumultuous early days of the Trump administration.