College-educated workers think the job market is as bad as it was in 2013
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Workers, especially those with a college degree, think the job market is awful, a new Gallup analysis out Tuesday finds.
Why it matters: They could be on to something. Although the unemployment rate is relatively low at the moment, hiring has slowed a lot, particularly for professionals.
- Deteriorating worker sentiment can signal that things are about to get much worse.
- "Workers with higher levels of formal education were markedly less optimistic about the job market in 2025 than those with less schooling," writes Sarah Fioroni, a senior research consultant at Gallup.
The big picture: Labor market stress is just one of many looming known unknowns in a chaotic moment for the economy and markets.
- Oil prices are climbing; a private credit tantrum is in play, and AI disruption is everywhere.
- Worries over stagflation are now part of most Wall Street investor notes on the economic outlook.
By the numbers: In separate polling of U.S. adults from Gallup, conducted from Jan. 2-17, just 27% of college grads said now is a good time to find a quality job, compared with 44% of those who didn't graduate from college.
- That's the widest gap on record going back to 2001.
- Until 2024, those with more advanced degrees were more optimistic.
- (The report out Tuesday finds a similar gap, citing a different survey of U.S. workers, with only 19% of college-educated employees saying it's a good time to find a quality job, compared with 35% of employees without a college degree.)
Zoom in: Sentiment among the college-educated about the job market is at its lowest since 2013.
- That was a time when the U.S. was still slowly climbing back from a recession. The unemployment rate was more than 6%. (This past February, unemployment was at 4.4%.)
Between the lines: But the critical factor to watch is the hiring rate. Outside of the blip we had during the pandemic, hiring is at its worst level since 2013, per federal data.
Where it stands: In white-collar industries, however, hiring is even worse, says Cory Stahle, an economist at Indeed, the jobs site.
- There were 29% fewer job listings for software developers in March than there were before the pandemic, per Indeed data.
- There were 27% fewer marketing jobs — and 36% fewer listings for media and communications roles.
- Job listings in manufacturing, meanwhile, are up. So are help wanted ads for doctors. "You see a real bifurcation," Stahle says.
Zoom out: Professionals are worried over the decline in white-collar hiring, reports of professional sector layoffs and, of course, AI.
What to watch: "If we continue to see fewer jobs available and more people wanting jobs, those things are a recipe for unemployment," Stahle says.
- That's also a recipe for lower economic growth.
"Most educated people I know are pretty freaked about what AI means for their jobs," says Martha Gimbel, executive director and cofounder of the Budget Lab at Yale.
- "We can argue about whether or not that's going to happen, but that's not what fear is about."
Reality check: Firing rates are still relatively low. Gimbel points out that the deteriorating worker sentiment could be part of an overall "vibecession" — when people feel bad about the economy while the overall economy holds up fine.
- She also suggested that educated professionals might lean more toward Democrats, and their worsening sentiment could track the political environment.
- "One thing that's really hard with all these metrics is to pull out how much of it is about actual economic concerns versus political concerns."
The bottom line: Workers with college degrees think it's a bad time to find a job, and the question is, is it about to get worse?
