6 ms·

The graduate 'jobpocalypse': Where have all the entry-level jobs gone? [video]

27 points by sarmike31 1y ago

al_borland 1y ago
It’s kind of interesting. When my sister graduated from college in 2003, the speaker mentioned it was the worst time ever to try and find a job. A couple years later in 2005, I heard the same thing when I graduated. I heard it at various other times over the years. And now today it is still the worst time ever to find a job. After hearing the same line, fairly consistently, for nearly 25 years, I’m having a hard time taking it seriously.
- davydm 1y ago
  you shouldn't - it was "the worst time to get a job" when I graduated in the late 90s too there are a lot of factors involved, and AI is likely facilitating some of the bad behavior, but the problem seems to always come back to greed and corporate profit /2c
- spwa4 1y ago
  I finished the first year of Uni in June 2000, and my parents had informed me they would not support me the second year. So it was critical to find a job at that time. Found one. Didn't pay well, but covering a room + uni entry fees was pretty easy. More money than I'd ever seen except ... Then, due to working full-time, it took me 7 years to finish my Uni degree and I managed to screw up my entry form in the final year. Meaning I got my master's degree in Aug 2008. Both ended well. Hell in 2000 I wasn't even aware what was happening, though after a few months I figured out some of my colleagues were making 4x what I was making. But it was enough and I still climbed up. I'm working on a doctorate now. Though one fact seems inevitable: if I ever finish it, the AIpocalypse will happen right exactly that month.
  - netdevphoenix 1y ago
    What's your field? That's a long time climbing the academic ladder. Is this Computer Vision or some other Machine Learning field?
    - spwa4 1y ago
      IT
- aatd86 1y ago
  for me in 2012 as well.. 2008 having alledgedly wiped a lot of jobs... recession fears and all that...
- gdulli 1y ago
  I see this meme a lot but the problem with it is that in the fable, the wolf really does come at the end.
- roxolotl 1y ago
  We have this data[0]. It’s not that bad out there right now compared to 2008-2013 but it is way worse than a few years ago. Everything is relative when it come to how people feel. 0: https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/college-labor-market#--:explore:unemployment https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/college-labor-market#--:...
  - squishington 1y ago
    My feeling is there are often factors which are not captured in job market statistics, which is why it's important to listen to the experience of grads seeking jobs. When I graduated in 2018, it took me a whole year to land a job (graduated with first class honours in electronics engineering in Australia, with 7 months overseas experience working for a chip design company in germany and a research scholarship at university). I came across job interviewers who had very irrational approaches to hiring, which I suspect was partly because they had too many applicants and were overworked processing them. One medical hardware company turned me down because they said I was overqualified and would get bored and quit. Overqualified as a grad. What a joke. I just needed a job before the next round of grads came out and left me forever shut out of my future field. It was a massive shock to my system as I had done nothing but work hard for years to get top marks and industry experience, and it still wasn't satisfactory (also building projects to showcase in interviews). I feel for new grads.
    - unmole 1y ago
      > why it's important to listen to the experience of grads seeking jobs. Anecdotes from people who didn't experience any other hiring market?
      - squishington 1y ago
        For what it's worth, one of my uni lecturers in my final uni year told me that over half the cohort for that year would never work in engineering because there weren't enough jobs. He said the uni didn't want him imparting that information but he thought it was unethical. I'm sure he had a historical perspective that informed that advice. I've worked with older guys who got engineering jobs without degrees and taught themselves FPGA design on the job in the 80s and 90s. There's no chance of that happening now.
- suddenlybananas 1y ago
  Well, if things are gradually getting worse year over year it would always be true.
- ceedan 1y ago
  Compared to the 90s, I'm sure those years did feel pretty awful, but 2008-2010 were far worse. The global financial crisis caused college graduates to return to school for additional 1-2 year degrees in order to simply defer student loan payments, and avoid the job market. Once they graduated from their masters programs, or additional majors, they were still applying for the same entry level positions.
  - Bolwin 1y ago
    That's exactly what's happening now too
- wetpaws 1y ago
  [dead]
davydm 1y ago
Companies only hiring people with experience is far from a new problem. Back in the late 90s, I struggled to get my first job that actually used my studied skills. Yes, I had a job - delivering pizza - but I was desperately trying to get a job _coding_, and in-between virtue-signallers only hiring people of a specific race and the vast majority of companies expecting years of experience, it took quite a while and I really only found a position because the place I studied at gets actively involved in the process. Yes, the trend of trying to replace entry-level jobs with AI doesn't help, but this isn't a new problem. Few businesses have the foresight to train up employees, and a lot are understandably disillusioned by entry-level churn, where you train people, and the moment they have skills, they skip off to another company, usually for more money - when losing that person costs the company more than if they'd just pay them a market-related salary. AI isn't helping, but it's far from a new problem - it's just exacerbated by the corporate greed chasing ever more profit, where the easiest way to see a short-term financial gain is to cut salaries.
- nerdsniper 1y ago
  What was the ‘specific race’ that was popular to hire in the ‘90s?
  - iamflimflam1 1y ago
    Back then being white and nerdy was a super power. Probably a lot tougher for non white and non male.
    - nerdsniper 1y ago
      Contextually that couldn't have been what OP was saying, because they linked it to "virtue-signallers".
- piltdownman 1y ago
  You're blaming DEI for not getting a job... during the .com boom? If ever there was a softer time to get hired as a developer, I have yet to hear of it.
undebuggable 1y ago
There are three career stages. First you're not qualified enough, then for a moment you're overqualified, and at last you're too old. The last stage occurs few decades before statutory retirement age.
- c2h5oh 1y ago
  Similar three stages are also at every job you have: - you underperform while onboarding and rapidly learning to cover whatever skill gaps you discover - you slowly go from doing OK to being overqualified, but it doesn't get reflected in compensation or title enough and your employer has little incentive to help you reach the next stage, because you are currently overperforming compared to your pay - you are so much past your paygrade you quit and go to a company that will pay you what you will be worth after onboarding and learning to cover skill gaps With everything that companies provided to earn long term employee loyalty being sacrificed to stock price employee growth through multiple roles in the same company has become more of an exception.
GoToRO 1y ago
From my own, local experience: the job is there, they just don't have the money to hire someone to do it. But the need is there.
- netdevphoenix 1y ago
  If I was to start a business, I would be asked whether the cashflow is good enough to run the business. If it's not, because maybe I need some expensive resources I have no way to pay for even though the need is there, the business surely should not exist.
  - darth_avocado 1y ago
    That would disqualify most of the startups into “should not exist” category.
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
cadamsdotcom 1y ago
What we used to think of as an entry level job is gone. The pieces of the role are slowly being absorbed into tooling and automation. Entry level candidates must get some midlevel skills & experience to become hireable. The education system is inadequate right now, so this means building a portfolio. Fortunately there’s an infinitely patient teacher you can lean on: AI! Plus an insanely good resource in the form of youtube. It’s never been a better time to be a self-starter. And it’s never been a worse time to be hat-in-hand, out there begging for a job.

27 points by sarmike31 1y ago

It’s kind of interesting. When my sister graduated from college in 2003, the speaker mentioned it was the worst time ever to try and find a job. A couple years later in 2005, I heard the same thing when I graduated. I heard it at various other times over the years. And now today it is still the worst time ever to find a job. After hearing the same line, fairly consistently, for nearly 25 years, I’m having a hard time taking it seriously.

davydm 1y ago
you shouldn't - it was "the worst time to get a job" when I graduated in the late 90s too there are a lot of factors involved, and AI is likely facilitating some of the bad behavior, but the problem seems to always come back to greed and corporate profit /2c
spwa4 1y ago
I finished the first year of Uni in June 2000, and my parents had informed me they would not support me the second year. So it was critical to find a job at that time. Found one. Didn't pay well, but covering a room + uni entry fees was pretty easy. More money than I'd ever seen except ... Then, due to working full-time, it took me 7 years to finish my Uni degree and I managed to screw up my entry form in the final year. Meaning I got my master's degree in Aug 2008. Both ended well. Hell in 2000 I wasn't even aware what was happening, though after a few months I figured out some of my colleagues were making 4x what I was making. But it was enough and I still climbed up. I'm working on a doctorate now. Though one fact seems inevitable: if I ever finish it, the AIpocalypse will happen right exactly that month.
- netdevphoenix 1y ago
  What's your field? That's a long time climbing the academic ladder. Is this Computer Vision or some other Machine Learning field?
  - spwa4 1y ago
    IT
aatd86 1y ago
for me in 2012 as well.. 2008 having alledgedly wiped a lot of jobs... recession fears and all that...
gdulli 1y ago
I see this meme a lot but the problem with it is that in the fable, the wolf really does come at the end.
roxolotl 1y ago
We have this data[0]. It’s not that bad out there right now compared to 2008-2013 but it is way worse than a few years ago. Everything is relative when it come to how people feel. 0: https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/college-labor-market#--:explore:unemployment https://www.newyorkfed.org/research/college-labor-market#--:...
- squishington 1y ago
  My feeling is there are often factors which are not captured in job market statistics, which is why it's important to listen to the experience of grads seeking jobs. When I graduated in 2018, it took me a whole year to land a job (graduated with first class honours in electronics engineering in Australia, with 7 months overseas experience working for a chip design company in germany and a research scholarship at university). I came across job interviewers who had very irrational approaches to hiring, which I suspect was partly because they had too many applicants and were overworked processing them. One medical hardware company turned me down because they said I was overqualified and would get bored and quit. Overqualified as a grad. What a joke. I just needed a job before the next round of grads came out and left me forever shut out of my future field. It was a massive shock to my system as I had done nothing but work hard for years to get top marks and industry experience, and it still wasn't satisfactory (also building projects to showcase in interviews). I feel for new grads.
  - unmole 1y ago
    > why it's important to listen to the experience of grads seeking jobs. Anecdotes from people who didn't experience any other hiring market?
    - squishington 1y ago
      For what it's worth, one of my uni lecturers in my final uni year told me that over half the cohort for that year would never work in engineering because there weren't enough jobs. He said the uni didn't want him imparting that information but he thought it was unethical. I'm sure he had a historical perspective that informed that advice. I've worked with older guys who got engineering jobs without degrees and taught themselves FPGA design on the job in the 80s and 90s. There's no chance of that happening now.
suddenlybananas 1y ago
Well, if things are gradually getting worse year over year it would always be true.
ceedan 1y ago
Compared to the 90s, I'm sure those years did feel pretty awful, but 2008-2010 were far worse. The global financial crisis caused college graduates to return to school for additional 1-2 year degrees in order to simply defer student loan payments, and avoid the job market. Once they graduated from their masters programs, or additional majors, they were still applying for the same entry level positions.
- Bolwin 1y ago
  That's exactly what's happening now too
wetpaws 1y ago
[dead]

davydm 1y ago

Companies only hiring people with experience is far from a new problem. Back in the late 90s, I struggled to get my first job that actually used my studied skills. Yes, I had a job - delivering pizza - but I was desperately trying to get a job _coding_, and in-between virtue-signallers only hiring people of a specific race and the vast majority of companies expecting years of experience, it took quite a while and I really only found a position because the place I studied at gets actively involved in the process. Yes, the trend of trying to replace entry-level jobs with AI doesn't help, but this isn't a new problem. Few businesses have the foresight to train up employees, and a lot are understandably disillusioned by entry-level churn, where you train people, and the moment they have skills, they skip off to another company, usually for more money - when losing that person costs the company more than if they'd just pay them a market-related salary. AI isn't helping, but it's far from a new problem - it's just exacerbated by the corporate greed chasing ever more profit, where the easiest way to see a short-term financial gain is to cut salaries.

nerdsniper 1y ago
What was the ‘specific race’ that was popular to hire in the ‘90s?
- iamflimflam1 1y ago
  Back then being white and nerdy was a super power. Probably a lot tougher for non white and non male.
  - nerdsniper 1y ago
    Contextually that couldn't have been what OP was saying, because they linked it to "virtue-signallers".
piltdownman 1y ago
You're blaming DEI for not getting a job... during the .com boom? If ever there was a softer time to get hired as a developer, I have yet to hear of it.

undebuggable 1y ago

There are three career stages. First you're not qualified enough, then for a moment you're overqualified, and at last you're too old. The last stage occurs few decades before statutory retirement age.

c2h5oh 1y ago
Similar three stages are also at every job you have: - you underperform while onboarding and rapidly learning to cover whatever skill gaps you discover - you slowly go from doing OK to being overqualified, but it doesn't get reflected in compensation or title enough and your employer has little incentive to help you reach the next stage, because you are currently overperforming compared to your pay - you are so much past your paygrade you quit and go to a company that will pay you what you will be worth after onboarding and learning to cover skill gaps With everything that companies provided to earn long term employee loyalty being sacrificed to stock price employee growth through multiple roles in the same company has become more of an exception.

GoToRO 1y ago

From my own, local experience: the job is there, they just don't have the money to hire someone to do it. But the need is there.

netdevphoenix 1y ago
If I was to start a business, I would be asked whether the cashflow is good enough to run the business. If it's not, because maybe I need some expensive resources I have no way to pay for even though the need is there, the business surely should not exist.
- darth_avocado 1y ago
  That would disqualify most of the startups into “should not exist” category.

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

cadamsdotcom 1y ago

What we used to think of as an entry level job is gone. The pieces of the role are slowly being absorbed into tooling and automation. Entry level candidates must get some midlevel skills & experience to become hireable. The education system is inadequate right now, so this means building a portfolio. Fortunately there’s an infinitely patient teacher you can lean on: AI! Plus an insanely good resource in the form of youtube. It’s never been a better time to be a self-starter. And it’s never been a worse time to be hat-in-hand, out there begging for a job.