Job Market Issues: College Grads

 Job Market Issues: College Grads

A college degree has long been one of the most reliable guards against unemployment. That shield may be breaking, a new Goldman Sachs analysis argues.

The unemployment rate for workers with a bachelor's degree or higher climbed to 2.8% in December, up from 2.6% a year earlier, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

While still below the national unemployment rate of 4.4%, college-educated workers are facing an increasingly unfavorable labor market compared with other groups.

From 2023 to 2025, industries that employ the largest shares of college graduates, including information services, finance, and professional and business services, shed an average of 9,000 jobs per month, according to the analysis by Goldman Sachs economist Jessica Rindels. Before the pandemic, those same industries added 44,000 jobs per month.

A strong labor market and fast-paced hiring in 2021 to 2022 led to low unemployment rates—particularly in fields that mainly hire college graduates. However, in recent years, hiring has stalled, with employers halting hiring or firing workers, essentially locking many college graduates, and especially young college graduates, out of the labor market.

Source: Goldman Sachs