WASHINGTON (AP) – When Carly Kalib left her job in Kansas City and moved to Chicago a year ago, she thought it would take three to six months to find a new job. After all, the 32-year-old project manager had never been unemployed for more than three months.
Instead, 700 applications later, she’s still looking, embroiled in a long, frustrating job search that’s far more difficult than the last time she looked for a job just a few years ago. uncertainty is over interest rate, customs duty, immigrationand with artificial intelligence disrupting large parts of the economy, several companies she interviewed for suddenly decided not to hire the job at all.
“I’ve definitely completely ruled out positions that I’m interviewing for, not even moving forward with hiring,” she said.
Caprivé is in a historical anomaly. Unemployment is low and the economy is in decline. still growingBut unemployed people are facing the slowest pace of employment in more than a decade. Diane Swonk, chief economist at KPMG, calls this an “unemployment boom.”
meanwhile Announcement of layoffs at large companies What usually gets the most attention is the reluctance of many companies to add employees, creating a job market that’s even tougher than the low unemployment rate of 4.3% would suggest. And the situation is even more polarized, with an economy that has fewer jobs and fewer layoffs, with fewer layoffs for those with jobs, while the unemployed struggle to find work.
“It’s like an internal-external relationship,” said Guy Berger, director of research at the Burning Glass Institute. “Insiders have historically been isolated in an environment with fewer layoffs, but outsiders who need work have a hard time coming in.”
Recently, several large companies have announced layoffs in the tens of thousands over the past few weeks. UPS, targetHowever, Berger said it was too early to tell whether they signaled an economic downturn. But increasing layoffs will be especially difficult when hiring numbers are already very low.
At the moment, it’s harder than ever to get a clear picture of the job market, as the U.S. Department of Labor’s monthly employment statistics are no longer available due to the government shutdown. Employment data for October was due to be released on Friday, but the release has been postponed. Numbers for the previous September. The October report may not be comprehensive at the time of publication as not all data may have been collected.
Before the government shutdown, the Labor Department reported that the employment rate (the number of people hired that month as a percentage of payroll) fell to 3.2% in August, matching the lowest non-pandemic rate since March 2013.
At the time, the unemployment rate was at a pitiful 7.5%, as the economy was slowly recovering from the job losses caused by the Great Recession of 2008-2009. This is significantly higher than August’s 4.3%.
Many unemployed people are skeptical about the current low interest rates. Brad Mizrow, 54, lost his job as an advertising executive in New York City and has been unemployed for the past three years. Now he works as a substitute teacher to make a living.
“It’s frustrating to hear that unemployment is low and the economy is doing well,” he said. “I think there are people in this economy who are basically fighting every day in shark-infested waters, clinging to flotsam debris, and have no idea what it’s like.”
Financial markets have focused on private sector data in the wake of the government shutdown, but the picture is mixed. On Thursday, outplacement support company Challenger Gray & Christmas upset investors According to the announcement, layoffs in October jumped 175% from a year earlier.
But on Wednesday, payroll processor ADP said net employment rose in October as companies added 42,000 jobs, after two months of declines. Still, profits were modest. ADP’s numbers are based on anonymous data from 26 million employees at its client companies.
Separately, workplace analytics firm Rebellio Labs estimated on Thursday that economic growth led to a loss of 9,000 jobs in October. federal reserve bank of chicago estimate The unemployment rate rose to 4.4% last month.
Even as the government released data, economists and Federal Reserve officials I didn’t really understand How healthy the job market has been, or where it’s headed next. sharp decline Strengthening immigration and deportation It was possible to keep the unemployment rate low simply by reducing the supply of workers. The economy doesn’t need to create as many jobs to prevent unemployment from rising.
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell called for a “strange balance” as both the supply and demand for workers are decreasing.
Economists point to many reasons for the slump in employment, but most of them have one thing in common. Increased uncertainty from tariffs, the potential impact of artificial intelligence, and the current government shutdown. While investment in data centers to power AI is booming, rising interest rates are slowing down many other sectors of the economy, including manufacturing and housing.
“The economy is better off on paper than most Americans perceive because of the concentration of economic benefits[from AI],” Swonk said.
young Americans are faced the brunt The slowdown in employment is having an impact, but many older workers are also struggling.
Two years ago, Suzanne Elder, a 65-year-old operations manager with extensive experience in the medical field who lives in Chicago, quickly found work. Three months after quitting my job, I had three offers. Currently, she has been unemployed since April.
She worries that her age is a challenge, but it’s not holding her back. “I got a job at 63, so there’s no reason I shouldn’t get a job at 65,” she says.
Like many job seekers, she is appalled by the impersonal treatment from recruiters (often caused by recruiting software). She received an email from a company thanking her for speaking to her, even though she hadn’t had an interview. Another company that never responded to her resume asked her to fill out a questionnaire about their interactions.
Government data shows that the employment slump has led to longer periods of unemployment. More than a quarter of unemployed people have been out of work for more than six months, a figure that jumped in July and August and is up from 21% a year ago.
Swonk said such an increase is unusual outside of a recession.
The number of unemployed people who are giving up job hunting is increasing. According to research By the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. It also suppresses the unemployment rate because people who stop looking are not counted as unemployed.
But Kalib is still sticking with it, taking classes on Amazon’s Web Services Platform to improve her technology skills.
“We can’t be narrow-minded about what we’re willing to accept,” she says.
