Keya Nandi
Photographer: Madeleine Hordinski/BloombergMillions of Workers Are Left Out of the ‘Low-Hire, Low-Fire’ US Job Market
‘Sometimes it can be very disheartening because you start to devalue almost everything else you’ve done,’ says a job hunter who has applied for about 350 positions.
The “low-hire, low-fire” US labor market is leaving millions on the outside looking in.
It’s not just recent college graduates who are struggling to find entry-level positions. Out-of-work mid-career employees are taking part-time jobs, and hiring has stalled in industries from professional services to manufacturing. More than a quarter of the jobless have been out of work more than a half-year — the highest share since the mid-2010s excluding the pandemic-era years.