Youth Unemployment Hits 52-Year Low
August 16 2018 - 6:12PM
Dow Jones News
By Andrew Duehren
The unemployment rate among young Americans fell to its lowest
level in more than 50 years this summer, though the share of young
people looking for work remained well below its peak in 1989.
Of Americans between 16 and 24 years old actively looking for
work this summer, 9.2% were unemployed in July, the Labor
Department said Thursday, a drop from the 9.6% youth unemployment
rate in July 2017. It was the lowest midsummer joblessness rate for
youth since July 1966.
One of those finding work was Teandre Blincoe, 17, who placed in
a job this summer in an information technology division at Humana,
a health insurance company based in Louisville, Ky., by
KentuckianWorks, which has partnered with JPMorgan Chase & Co.
to place low-income youth in summer jobs.
With his first job under his belt, Mr. Blincoe said he would
feel more confident looking for employment in the future. "I have a
really solid idea of how I can present myself and actually get a
job."
Low unemployment among young people shows that in a tight labor
market more opportunities are opening to groups that historically
have struggled to find jobs.
Similarly, the unemployment rate among older Americans who don't
have a high-school diploma fell to a record low this year. The
jobless rate also fell sharply for those who completed high school
but never attended college. Among racial groups, the unemployment
rate for Latinos fell to 4.5% in July, the lowest rate on records
back to the 1970s.
The jobless rate for black Americans touched a record low this
year before rising in the past two months. For black youth, the
jobless rate ticked up this summer to 16.5% from 16.2% in 2017,
meaning this segment of the population hasn't benefited as much as
many others looking for work.
While millions of young people continue to enter the labor force
in the summer months, the labor-force participation rate among
young Americans -- a measure of how many people are actively
seeking employment -- is still low by historical standards.
In July, the labor-force participation rate was 60.6% among
young Americans, the same rate as last year and the highest since
2009. In 1989, the summer youth labor-force participation rate was
77.5%, and it has declined since.
Paul Harrington, an economist at Drexel University who studies
the labor market for young people, said one reason for the decrease
in the share of teenagers and young adults seeking summer work is
the popularity of extracurricular activities and unpaid
internships.
"If you don't do those extracurricular activities, it diminishes
your chances of getting admitted to prestigious postsecondary
institutions," he said.
For young people already admitted to college, unpaid
internships, which the Labor Department doesn't classify as
employment, are often important initial steps toward postgraduate
employment.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
August 16, 2018 17:57 ET (21:57 GMT)
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