Census: Recession takes big toll on young adults

— Young adults are the recession's lost generation.

In record numbers, they're struggling to find work, shunning long-distance moves to live with mom and dad, delaying marriage and raising kids out of wedlock, if they're becoming parents at all. The unemployment rate for them is the highest since World War II, and they risk living in poverty more than others - nearly 1 in 5.

New 2010 census data released Thursday show the wrenching impact of a recession that officially ended in mid-2009. There are missed opportunities and dim prospects for a generation of mostly 20-somethings and 30-somethings coming of age in a prolonged period of joblessness.

"We have a monster jobs problem, and young people are the biggest losers," said Andrew Sum, an economist and director of the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University. He noted that for recent college graduates getting by on waitressing, bartending and odd jobs, they will have to compete with new graduates for entry-level career positions when the job market does improve.


Richard Freeman, an economist at Harvard University, said young people "will be scarred and they will be called the `lost generation' - in that their careers would not be the same way if we had avoided this economic disaster."


Most immigrants continue to be low-skilled workers from Latin America, with growing numbers from Asia also arriving. An estimated 11.2 million people are in the U.S. illegally.

People age 65 and older tended to return to or stay in their jobs, accounting for the few employment gains in recent months. About 1 in 6 older people is now in the labor force. That's the highest level since the 1960s, before more generous Social Security and Medicare benefits made it more attractive to retire.

Employment among young adults 16-29 was 55.3 percent, compared with 67.3 percent in 2000; it's the lowest since the end of World War II.

Young males who lacked a college degree were most likely to lose jobs due to reduced demand for blue-collar jobs in construction, manufacturing and transportation during the downturn. Among teenagers, employment was less than 30 percent.

The employment-to-population ratio for all age groups from 2007-2010 dropped faster than for any similar period since the government began tracking the data in 1948. In the past year, 43 of the 50 largest metropolitan areas continued to post declines in employment: Charlotte, N.C., Jacksonville, Fla., Las Vegas, Phoenix, Los Angeles and Detroit. Each experienced a severe housing bust, budget deficit or meltdown in industries such as banking or manufacturing.

Without work, young adults aren't starting careers and lives in new cities.



