Harry Haysom for The Chronicle.

Dear Commons Community,

L. Maren Wood, the director and chief executive of the Center for Graduate Career Success, has an article in today’s Chronicle of Higher Education, warning college graduates of the “worst job market” in a generation. Here is an excerpt.

“As a long-time observer of hiring trends, I’m (L. Maren Wood) increasingly concerned about the career prospects of graduate students and postdocs in the next few years. This will very likely be the worst job market in a generation, and many of them lack strategies and support to manage the tumult.

I work with nearly 80 universities as director and chief executive of the Center for Graduate Career Success, and I can tell you, the hiring outlook has rarely looked this grim:

• Faculty hiring will almost certainly be at a near standstill in the next academic year. Universities were already facing an enrollment cliff driven by the decline in the number of 18- to 24-year-olds in the United States, and the fact that fewer high-school graduates are planning on attending college. Fewer students mean fewer faculty members. Now that outlook is being exacerbated by political factors. The hostility toward immigrants and international students may deter many from studying in the United States. Federal funding cuts have already led to hiring freezes at many institutions.
• In other economic downturns — such as the Great Recession of 2008 or the Covid pandemic — graduate students could extend time in their programs or move into postdoc positions. But this time, federal cuts have eliminated many postdoc positions and constricted funding for existing grad students.
• A shrinking federal work force means fewer job opportunities in that sector for Ph.D.s. The highly skilled federal workers being laid off have years of experience and are now moving into state and local governments, further diminishing opportunities for new graduates.
• Meanwhile, hiring in the private sector has slowed to rates not seen since 2009. When people expect a recession, they act accordingly. Uncertainty caused by tariffs and the trade war threatens to slow hiring further.

So this time is different. In 2008, President Barack Obama and a Democratic majority in Congress quickly passed a stimulus bill to revive the economy. During Covid, the federal government passed stimulus bills to mitigate the worst economic effects of the pandemic. But today’s looming economic downturn is a direct result of federal government policies: The Trump administration’s attack on higher education is intentional. Deterring international students is the plan. Tariffs and cuts in the federal work force are the fulfillment of campaign promises.”

The entire column offers advice for graduates but the future is indeed gloomy.

Tony

This entry is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.