Blame the alteration connected AI eating entry-level white-collar activity and a skilled trades shortage that fewer saw coming.
By Jon Small | edited by Dan Bova | Sep 08, 2026
Workers ages 22 to 34 pinch nary assemblage grade are seeing immoderate of their lowest unemployment rates successful decades. Meanwhile, their degree-holding compatriots are having 1 of their worst stretches successful years, according to a caller study from the Burning Glass Institute reported by the Wall Street Journal.
“I don’t deliberation it’s a impermanent thing,” says Gad Levanon, Burning Glass’s main economist.
The reason? Part of it comes down to basal proviso and demand. Skilled trades are short connected workers arsenic older generations discontinue and migration restrictions shrink the labour pool. At the aforesaid time, much Americans than ever are graduating college, correct arsenic AI takes complete the entry-level tasks companies utilized to prosecute caller grads to do.
The news isn’t each bad for grade holders. They still person an easier clip uncovering activity successful absolute terms: their unemployment complaint sits astatine 2.7%, compared to 4.7% for workers pinch only a precocious schoolhouse diploma. But historically, those pinch degrees are having a bad run, while those without 1 are having 1 of their best.
Workers ages 22 to 34 pinch nary assemblage grade are seeing immoderate of their lowest unemployment rates successful decades. Meanwhile, their degree-holding compatriots are having 1 of their worst stretches successful years, according to a caller study from the Burning Glass Institute reported by the Wall Street Journal.
“I don’t deliberation it’s a impermanent thing,” says Gad Levanon, Burning Glass’s main economist.
The reason? Part of it comes down to basal proviso and demand. Skilled trades are short connected workers arsenic older generations discontinue and migration restrictions shrink the labour pool. At the aforesaid time, much Americans than ever are graduating college, correct arsenic AI takes complete the entry-level tasks companies utilized to prosecute caller grads to do.
The news isn’t each bad for grade holders. They still person an easier clip uncovering activity successful absolute terms: their unemployment complaint sits astatine 2.7%, compared to 4.7% for workers pinch only a precocious schoolhouse diploma. But historically, those pinch degrees are having a bad run, while those without 1 are having 1 of their best.
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