Kids 'Thrown Out Of The Labor Market In A Big Way,' Report Says (CHART)

According to a new report (.pdf) from Northeastern University's Center for Labor Market Studies says the teen job market has collapsed -- leading to a "true depression in the nation's teen labor market."

USA Today has more:

[Northeastern professor Andrew] Sum laid out the competition teens faced in the last decade for low-level jobs: Older workers (55-plus), young college graduates (25 and under), immigrants and, as the construction and manufacturing sectors weakened, blue-collar workers.

"Teen workers occupy the 'last hired, first fired' rung on the job ladder, and their employment is hit much harder during downturns than that of older workers," wrote Heidi Shierholz, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute, in a 2009 analysis. This has certainly been true this recession, when teens have been hurt more than any other age group.

One suggested solutions is a special, lower minimum wage for workers aged 16 to 19, although the federal government has not expressed significant interest in the idea. However, USA Today reports, a bill that allotting $1 billion for youth job growth was passed last month by the House, which would go to creating 350,000 positions.

What do you think? Are you, or teens you know, having trouble finding employment? Join the discussion below.

Comments

[Huffpuff1]

04:40 AM on 07/01/2010

It sucks being born at the wrong time. Timing is everything. If only one could cut out, say, the next four years of life, and re-enter without the dreaded gap in employment. That is, if the economy has improved by then.

Or you could ask your friend to become your fake boss, you the fake employee at a fake company and he will vouch for your employment as a loyal worker. Ha ha, I know this has been done by someone!

[Haylee Phinn Thikeo]

10:56 AM on 06/28/2010

I love how when everything "goes wrong" people start blaming the immigrants. Good. Because that solves everything!

[klbrz]

04:03 PM on 06/23/2010

If we have a lower wage for teens, then we will have a problem with more older workers being unemployed. In this economy, especially, lots of people are suffering, and there's not much that can be done about that. At least teens are more likely to be able to fall back on their parents. Most adults, especially senior citizens, don't have that kind of back up. Putting them out of work will cost society more than keeping teens out of work.

[MetrointheWoods]

12:06 PM on 06/23/2010

Personally, I think we need a graduated minimum wage. Ages 16-18 would make ~85% of the minimum wage, ages 18-20 make ~90% of minimum wage, and at 21, someone begins making 100% of minimum wage. Lower FICA, witholding, etc. Make it easier for small businesses and non-profits to put these kids to work.

[Retrofuturistic]

11:41 AM on 06/23/2010

This is not rocket science. When you bring in millions of immigrants "to take the jobs Americans don't want to do" (who says they don't want to do them?), you then remove all the jobs that teenagers used to do. So now we have a whole country full of unemployed teenagers. Duhhhhhh.

[MetrointheWoods]

11:58 AM on 06/23/2010

Those contractors and planters who live in mostly Sunbelt states say that. For what it's worth, they're right: Americans by and large won't work for slave wages.

[zeppelingirl89]

04:01 PM on 06/23/2010

I did work for crappy wages as a teenager for 4 years. Now surprisingly, this summer I can't find a job. The jobs that immigrants do teenagers can do.

[pjt2352]

05:02 PM on 06/23/2010

Americans should not have to work for slave wages. I live in a sunbelt state and worked all those 'jobs Americans don't want to do' as a teen and young adult. I bet if business were not allowed to hire illegals and pay illegal wages business owners would again find that teens and young adult work just fine.

[middleoftheroad]

12:44 PM on 06/24/2010

The problem we have right now with teen unemployment is not because of illegals...it's because of the economy, the destruction of Main Street, and high minimum wages based on sales.

[PhoenixGSU]

08:14 AM on 06/23/2010

I really don't understand why Obama hasn't brought back some of the programs from the 30's. We could be overhauling our infrastructure and greening our cities. Bring back the CCC.

[TehChef]

12:29 AM on 06/23/2010

I'd mow lawns for minimum wage right now if I could even get that, but I can't... and I live in Florida, the land of weekly mowings and over-the-top landscaping.

[grumpyfarmer]

12:26 AM on 06/23/2010

Up until 2005 I hired teenage help every summer, most of them started for me in high school and worked through college. The minimum wage was lower, but at the end of the summer if we had done well I gave them a bonus. However, as time went on, it became harder and harder to find kids that would actually do any work. Then, my insurance company got involved and told me all the extra insurance I had to have, then my accountant hit me with withholding....I finally said to hell with it. I wasn't going to beg a teenager to come to work, pay higher liability premiums, jack with withholding for someone working for me for 12 weeks, and work around the now ever present sports practices. For the most part, I wound up with great help through the 1990s, but I guess those days are over. It is too bad too, I think the guys who worked for me learned a lot, and I got much more done.

[PhoenixGSU]

08:04 AM on 06/23/2010

I'd work for you and I don't even know what the job is yet. 24, trying to pay my way through college at this time is very challenging, even with help from my parents.

[yudkib]

09:54 PM on 06/22/2010

23, masters of engineering in structural engineering, 40-60 resumes out, no interviews.

[KriTiKiT]

09:40 PM on 06/22/2010

I'm 30 and no one is hiring, or its the same ad posted week after week that they never fill.

[RightWingMarine]

04:35 PM on 06/22/2010

eliminating the min wage would reduce teen unemployment.Teens don't have the skills or knowledge to do much by continually increasing the min wage they will be paid just makes it too expensive to hire a teen. Why not hire someone else with work experience for only slightly more or even the same price as the wet behind the ears teen?
we certainly don't need to have the federal govt creating summer jobs for teens. It is not the responsibility of our govt to provide employment to teenagers. Our Congress should limit itself to enacting laws that create favorable conditions for business to expand and hire.

[EducatedNative]

05:24 PM on 06/22/2010

"Eliminating the min wage" would be stupid. Jobs that pay minimum wage don't really require "the skills or knowledge to do much", that's why teens are good hires for jobs like that. It doesn't sound like you've ever had to work a minimum wage job. If you did (like I've had to do), you would realize it sucks. A lot. The pay is HORRIBLE and I can't imagine what it would be like if they could pay you less. Don't go around making suggestions about things you don't really know about.

[hypnotoad72]

06:28 PM on 06/22/2010

Well said!

[butch45]

04:23 PM on 06/23/2010

if you are worth a crap you will not make the min wage for more than a few months , if you worked for the min wage for years you probably not a very good employee

[hypnotoad72]

06:30 PM on 06/22/2010

Congress is so busy, they can't go back to the laws Bush signed that gave more incentives to companies THAT offshored. So until that happens, real incentives and favorable conditions may not return to America, land o' "taxpayer-funded bailouts to big companies that offshored too much then get bailed out then continue to offshore because that makes the balance sheet look better this quarter and what's that about the long-term future again?" will likely continue.

http://www.cwalocal4250.org/outsourcing/binarydata/Bush%20Plan.pdf

[MetrointheWoods]

12:13 PM on 06/23/2010

Personally, I don't have a problem giving American companies some tax relief. As for American companies who have decided to register in Bermuda or the Cayman Islands, I'd propose an amnesty: give them 90 days to register back in the US, or else.

Looking at this oil disaster in the Gulf, we see the evil ExxonMobil with one safety violation, compared to BP's 780. I don't like saying this, but I think I'd trust ExxonMobil over BP anyday.

[butch45]

04:25 PM on 06/23/2010

exactly which laws are those that Bush signed be specific please

[bassaiguy]

04:31 PM on 06/22/2010

I live in a college town and my wife and I own a few rental properties to supplement our family income. Occasionally I hire high school and college students to help with landscaping, painting, cleaning etc. Sadly, I've been disappointed with the work ethic I've encountered. In the past ten years the best workers I've employed were a Chinese grad student and a first-generation American college student. They worked hard, didn't expect their hands to be held and didn't stop to text their girlfriends, check sports scores, and puke in my bushes. I've worked since I was fourteen and I don't see many American kids willing to bust their humps on the job anymore.

[hypnotoad72]

06:49 PM on 06/22/2010

How much did you pay 'em? :) How much more work did you coax out of them?

Employers will take everything a worker will give and encourage more. Free profit, why not?

I won't deny there are American kids who are lazy. I've adumbrated as much in other responses and in other articles. Some are. And then there's the "why" or the underlying psychological context. Just laziness or dwindling opportunities combined with an "emo" sense of defeatism or nihilism? It's not as simple as you make it out to be. Reality sucks, I know.

But don't try to race-bait this and make it sound like all Americans are lazy or that all Chinese are better. I've seen enough in my lifetime to know your generalizations are not 100% truisms.

[bassaiguy]

05:59 PM on 06/23/2010

I never said all Chinese were better. I said my two best temp workers were a Chinese grad student and a first generation Eastern European kid. I was commenting on how the work ethic of immigrants seems better than that of many American college students.

And, fwiw, I was working alongside them, not sitting in the master's chair. I paid the market wage in cash and expected them to do an honest day's work.

[SoCalRefugee]

10:43 PM on 06/22/2010

You just sound like a bad manager/hirer/judge of people to me. I'd stay in the renting-out-property business and keep away from anything where you hire or manage people.

[stevebol]

04:29 PM on 06/22/2010

Business people say they would rather hire foreigners. Workers here would rather work for foreigners. So what's the problem? Let's start a businessman exchange program. All you business types can get lost. Bring in foreigners to run the companies.
Everyone's happy.

[reggieb]

04:22 PM on 06/22/2010

both of my kids (working on their masters) are doing unpaid internships. They've had the minimum wage jobs but are to the point where the unpaid internships on their resumes might help them more when they graduate. they have taken out loans and we are helping them. both will be $20,000 in debt.

[dtairtime]

05:47 PM on 06/22/2010

Yet we continue to bring in record numbers of foreign VISA holders to take the jobs that companies "can't seem to find citizen employees for".

Contact your elected officials and DEMAND they look out for your kids, not foreigners.

[butch45]

04:27 PM on 06/23/2010

support arizona

[spoonerrothbard]

11:37 PM on 06/22/2010

Only 20 grand? I'm jealous.

[hjo4]

04:17 PM on 06/22/2010

Teen can thank illegal aliens and those who employ them for not being able to find summer jobs. But they supposedly do jobs Americans won't do. More citizens being penalized because of lawbreakers. Where are the advocates for our young people.

[The Albany Kid]

04:55 PM on 06/22/2010

Excellent point!

[bsc]

05:03 PM on 06/22/2010

tons of businesses in the service industry employ legal foreign students