Eager to work, teens find a frustrating summer job search

The summer job, a rite-of-passage for generations of American teenagers, isn’t so easy to come by.

About one-third of 16- to 19-year-olds in the U.S. were employed last summer, federal data show, down from a peak of about 60% in the late 1970s. Experts’ pessimistic forecasts are combining with reports from frustrated jobless young people around the country to form a seasonal outlook far from bathed in sunshine.

“The opportunities for workers at the start of the career ladder started to dry up,” says Nicole Bachaud, an economist for ZipRecruiter, saying teens are among the labor market's “most marginalized groups.”

Without a job, Chester worries her summer will be ruined. She wonders how she’ll fill her tank with gas and what she’ll do if she wants to go to a concert. A trip to look at colleges in North Carolina with some friends would be destined to be canceled. So her hunt continues.

Chester keeps copies of her resume in her car and has a 30-second spiel memorized when she decides to pop into a restaurant or store and try to talk with a manager. She and her friends help ready one another when they set out on their job hunt, trading tips and professional-looking clothes from their closets. Positions that once sounded awful to her, like dishwashing, no longer seem so.

“At this point,” says the teen from Lake Mary, Florida, “it would be hard to say no to anything.”

Analyzing data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the outplacement firm Challenger, Gray and Christmas found the number of jobs secured by teens fell 25% last summer from the year prior. The firm says inflation, oil prices and cautious hiring are likely to lead to even fewer jobs this year, resulting in the lowest summer hiring total for teens since the federal government began tracking it in 1948.

Teens most commonly work in food preparation and serving jobs and sales, according to BLS data. But Jaune Little, director of recruiting services at the human resources company Insperity, says some entry-level jobs have been eliminated and teens now compete with more experienced candidates for the remaining ones.

“A lot of the entry-level roles that once existed simply do not any longer,” Little says. “Those that do exist are on leaner teams that have less ability and desire to develop and train someone. In many instances, they are prioritizing more skilled workers even if they are overqualified.”

Max Stephenson began looking for a job last year after graduating from high school. Nothing turned up all summer. Once she began at the University of Arkansas-Pulaski Technical College, she got a work study position in the cafeteria, still keeping an eye out for a more permanent gig.

Now, school’s out again, and Stephenson is again jobless.

The 19-year-old from Little Rock, Arkansas, lost track of how many jobs she’s applied for, but thinks it’s somewhere between 50 and 100. She can’t help thinking it’s tougher than previous generations had it to find work paying around the minimum wage.

“I thought it would be much easier than it’s been,” Stephenson says. “Old people say, ‘Just walk in there and give them a firm handshake.’ That doesn’t work so well now.”

A 2022 report by Pew Research Center found summer employment of teens fell during the early 2000s dot-com bubble, and dropped even more during and after the Great Recession of 2007 to 2009. White teens are more likely to have a job than teens from any other racial group, Pew found.

Across demographics, though, teens are reporting difficult job searches, taking to Reddit and TikTok with rants about phantom postings, managers who ghost them and applications that go nowhere.

It’s a struggle Connor Vukelich knows well.

After he turned 16, he applied anywhere he could find in a 30-mile radius of his home near Vancouver, Washington. No offers followed and Vukelich’s friends were similarly coming up empty-handed.

“There’s all these ‘We’re Hiring’ signs but no one’s actually hiring,” Vukelich says. “What’s going on? Why can’t any of us find jobs?”

When his search turned fruitless, he ended up working on his parents’ lavender farm. But the frustration of the experience led Vukelich – who is now 20 and a student at Embry–Riddle Aeronautical University – to launch Poppin’ Jobs, an employment search site launched this year and aimed at teens and 20-somethings.

Vukelich believes artificial intelligence is robbing teens of some potential jobs and that laws to boost the minimum wage in some states have pitted first-time job-seekers against more experienced candidates.

“They don’t see the value in hiring someone without any experience,” he says of employers, “they’re not as willing to give someone that shot.”

Some teen applicants find painful job searches eventually pay off. Demie Njea, a 16-year-old from Lexington, Kentucky, started applying for jobs once she turned 14, her state’s legal working age. A search centered on fast food spots and stores turned to one that included jobs as a janitor, daycare worker and more.

Nothing went anywhere the first summer. Or the second. Njea estimates she applied for more than 100 jobs in all. She started wondering if she’d ever get a first job.

Finally, an offer came and Njea started working at Sonic. She is thrilled. But when a friend who turned 15 started applying for work, Njea had to be honest.

“I had to calmly put her down and say, ‘You’re not going to get it,’” Njea says. “It’s just not going to happen.”

Matt Sedensky can be reached at msedensky@ap.org and https://x.com/sedensky