Are Summer Jobs for Youth Getting Harder to Find?

In the sage words of Alice Cooper: "School's out for summer " (if not forever).

And that means millions of young people around the country are suddenly on the job hunt, flooding the labor market to make a quick buck in the dog days of summer.

The number of 16- to 24-year-olds working or actively looking for work grows sharply this time of year, as large numbers of high
school and college students search for summer jobs, and recent graduates enter the labor market to find permanent employment. Between April and July 2014, the number of youth workers jumped from about 2 million to more than 20 million, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

But summer youth unemployment remains stubbornly high, at roughly three times the national unemployment rate. And for 16- to 19-year-olds, that rate is significantly higher.

An NPR story last summer warned of a “lost generation of workers,” reporting that nearly 5.8 million youth were neither in school or employed.

In July 2014, typically the summertime peak of youth employment, just over 50 percent of the youth work force (16- to 24-year-olds) was employed, up slightly from the previous year, according to the BLS.  White youth were employed at the highest rate  (63.2%), followed by Hispanics (56.2%), blacks (52.9%) and Asians (45.8%).

About 25 percent of all employed youth worked in the leisure and hospitality industry (including  food services) and 19 percent in retail trades, the two largest youth employment sectors, the BLS reported.

The youth unemployment  rate, which was hit particularly hard between 2008 and 2010 (during the recession),  has actually declined in recent years: in July 2014, about 20 percent of 16- to 19-year-olds looking for work were unemployed, down from a peak of nearly 26 percent in 2010.

“The hardest part is having the employers be open-minded that this is a job that’s helping this individual,” says John Tran, a guidance counselor in Oakland High School's Wellness Center, who helps place students in jobs and internships. Despite the San Francisco Bay Area's recent boom, low-skilled jobs for youth can be hard to find, he says.

In fact, the rate of employment for 16- to 19-year-olds in the Bay Area was one of the lowest of any major metro region in the nation in 2010-11,  according to an analysis by the Brookings Institution of American Community Survey.

Tran says the most sought after summer jobs are at popular radio stations (public radio not included), Footlocker, and music and clothing retailers. The positions he helps students find generally have a leadership focus,  pairing teens with elementary school sites, after-school programs and summer camps.

Students typically find jobs by word of mouth, Tran adds. Youth non-profit organizations also offer good job resources and opportunities for inexperienced workers. But the jobs posted to online job clearinghouses, he notes, often list far more qualifications than the average  high school student will realistically have.

Some Bay Area job resources for youth

• Youth Employment Partnership

• Oakland Workforce Investment Board

• Mayor’s Youth Employment and Education Program (SF)

• San Francisco Summer Jobs

• Youth@Work