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Don’t Be Fooled! Young Adults Still In Trouble

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the unemployment rate dropped slightly to 8.9 percent in February, as the economy added an estimated 192,000 jobs. Young people, of course, are having a tougher time. Those ages 16 to 24 recorded an unemployment rate of 17.7 percent. The seemingly positive 0.4 percent drop from January actually reflects the fact that meager opportunity drove 140,000 young Americans from the labor market last month (The unemployment rate refers to individuals who have looked for work, but could not find any. So those who have not looked for work do not count as unemployed). Overall, young Americans lost an estimated 30,000 jobs in February.

Although young men receive more attention for their skyrocketing unemployment rates during the Great Recession, young women have struggled as well. At the outset, young men lost so many jobs that young women, for the first time ever, briefly achieved the same employment rates as their male peers (Note: The employment rate gives the proportion of population that is employed).

Over the last year, however, young men gained an additional 400,000 jobs, while another 190,000 positions disappeared for young women. Today over 1.1 million fewer women ages 16 to 24 have a job than before the recession. Those stark numbers followed a lost decade where employment rates for both young men and women never recovered from the Dot Com bust in 2001 (see the graph below).

 

 

The takeaway? Despite increasing economic growth, young people still struggle more than any other age group to find work, and young women in particular have yet to see their economic prospects improve.

Unemployment Graph 2011