The economic outlook has been shaky this year for recent graduates and others searching for employment opportunities, and may be shakier still after a slowdown in job growth last month.
The pace of growth has overall been solid—if not broad-based—but softened in May. The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ (BLS) Friday report indicated an increase of 139,000 jobs last month, down from the 147,000 payroll gains seen in April—though still close to the average monthly gain of 149,000 recorded month-to-month over the past year.
Recent graduates appear to be facing particular headwinds in hiring. The unemployment rate for adults between the ages of 22 to 27 increased to 5.8% in March, compared to the overall unemployment rate of 4.2%, which has remained more or less steady since May 2024, according to the latest BLS data.
The turmoil brought forth by President Donald Trump’s evolving tariff policy, which has dominated economic headlines in recent months, has played a role in shaping the current state of the economy. But experts note that the current job market has been in the making since the Federal Reserve began raising interest rates in 2022.
“Hiring has been slowing down for the last three years,” says Kory Kantenga, head of economics of the Americas at LinkedIn. “It’s generally what we call a low momentum job market.”
Here are the tips economists and other experts shared on how to secure a job.
Know which industries are hiring—and which aren’t
Though hiring is slowing in a number of industries, it’s booming in health care, which is recording the highest rates of employment growth. More than 60,000 new jobs, mostly in hospital and ambulatory services, were posted in the month of May, according to the BLS, making up nearly 45% of all new jobs in the country.
The leisure and hospitality industry closely followed, adding 48,000 jobs and continuing a trend of generating at least 30,000 jobs a month, per the BLS.
“Outside of those two sectors, you really saw very little employment growth, which to me is more negative,” says Harry Holzer, an economist, fellow at the Brookings Institution, and Georgetown University professor.
Federal funding cuts are also starkly affecting the research industry, putting jobs at universities and other organizations at risk. And federal government employment, which has seen massive cuts under President Donald Trump since the start of his second term, is still on the decline—making Washington, D.C., a hypercompetitive market. Payroll employment in the federal government sector is down by nearly 60,000 since January, though the true number could be even greater as employees on paid leave or severance pay are counted as “employed,” per BLS data.
Understand the state of the job market
Much of the turmoil of the job market has to do with the uncertainty surrounding federal policy, which is deterring companies from putting up new job postings. “Almost every day our economy is being bombarded by shock, mostly from the White House,” says Holzer. “You don’t know if they’re going to last from one day to the next so that’s why employers are on this holding pattern.”
Shifting tariff policies may already be affecting the retail industry, Holzer adds, which has seen some declines over the last two months. That change is also reflective of consumer confidence, which declined for months before jumping this May, though it remains low enough even following that increase to indicate a potential recession ahead.
Kantenga also notes that the elevated unemployment rate for workers aged 22 to 27 is unusual. “Since the 80s, [recent grads] have always had an unemployment rate that was either around overall unemployment or below it,” Kantenga says. Workers with a college degree still fare better on the job hunt than those without one, but the lack of movement for those that are currently employed are making backfill positions more and more limited.
Much of that has to do with the sectors that are most affected by elevated interest rates, says Kantenga: tech, information, and media and professional services. “These are really big industries that absorb a lot of new college grads, and those industries have been slowing hiring for about three years…even though we see on LinkedIn, tech and financial services seem to be stabilizing,” he says.
Andrew Challenger, senior vice president of Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc., a company that tracks job cut announcements, says that layoffs have been elevated for the first half of the year. “We have a real sense that there are more job cuts coming, and then we won’t necessarily continue to see job reports that are steady,” he says.
Play into your network now
Unfortunately, experts say the labor market is likely to worsen over the next few months, meaning job seekers need to start their job hunt process now.
“There’s often a tendency to want to take a little time off before you jump into a job, but it’s pretty hard to foresee a better labor market six to 12 months from now,” says Challenger.
Networking can make navigating the competitive labor market a bit easier. “We track where job seekers are finding their jobs, day in and day out, and still, two-thirds of our clients found their jobs through some sort of professional and personal networking,” Challenger adds.
Know how to market yourself
Adapting to the current needs of the labor market is also significant. Kantenga says that recruiters are looking for potential candidates who have a strong set of soft skills, but also know how to navigate AI in the workforce.
“[Employers] may not have figured out what they’re doing with AI, but they want to bring in people who are likely to be able to work with it in the future, to set them up for success,” says Kantenga.
Kantenga also advises job applicants to highlight relevant experience in a concrete way. He says that recruiters often point to the lack of qualifications of some candidates, making the job review process more arduous. “It may not be the case that a lot of candidates aren’t qualified, it’s just they’re not communicating well what their skills actually are,” he notes.